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Class 

Book_ - 



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C0EXRIGHT DEPOSm 












_^ l ffi"r~ A»-**jf...-ef- 



w I m '■■ ■ 



WORLD HISTORY 



IiY 

HUTTON ^EBSTER, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OK NEBRASKA 



" The true object of history is to show us the 
life of the human nice in its fullness, and to 
follow up the tale of its continuous and difficult 
evolution. The conception of the progress 
of civilization in intelligible sequence, is the 
greatest achievement of modern thought." — 
Frederic Harrison, The Meaning of History. 



D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 

BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO 



WEBSTER'S HISTORIES 



Webster's Ancient History 

From prehistoric times to the Age of Charlemagne 

Webster's Medieval and Modern History 

From the fall of Rome to the present 

Webster's Early European History 

From prehistoric times to the seventeenth century 

Webster's Modern European History 

From the Age of Louis XIV to the present: a year's course 

Webster's European History 
Part I — Ancient Times 

Ancient history and civilization 

Part II — Medieval and Early Modern Times 

From the fall of Rome to the seventeenth century 

Part III — Modern Times 

From the Age of Louis XIV to the present: a brief course 

Webster's World History 

From prehistoric times to the present 

Webster's Readings in Ancient History 

Webster's Readings in Medieval and Modern History 

Webster's Historical Source Book 



copyright, 1921 
by d. c. heath & co. 

2KI 



PRINTED IN U.S.A. 



- M -4 1922 
^CU654111 



PREFACE 

The scope, character, and purpose of this textbook perhaps 
require some clarification here. It covers the entire historic 
field, together with a chapter on prehistoric times; it presents 
a survey of human progress, rather than a chronological outline 
of events; it is intended for that large body of students who, 
for various reasons, do not take more than one year of history 
in the high school. They ought to gain from such a course, 
however brief, some conception of social development and 
some realization of man's upward march from the Stone Age 
until the present time. Nothing but general or universal 
history will give them that conception, — that realization. 
And only a history of the world will enable them to appreciate 
the contributions made by peoples widely separated in space 
and time to what is steadily becoming the common civilization 
of mankind. 

About two thirds of the book are devoted to the last three 
centuries. This period furnishes the immediate historical 
background of the life of to-day: it is therefore the period 
ordinarily most interesting and profitable to the student. 
The chapters dealing with it are reproduced, with some abbrevia- 
tion, from my Modem European History. The other chapters 
are based on my Early European History, but they contain 
much that is new, both in the text and also by way of maps 
and illustrations. 

Teachers will find in the book, as in its predecessors, a 
variety of aids. The "Suggestions for Further Study" provide 
extended bibliographies. The "Studies" at the end of each 
chapter may be used either in the daily recitation or for review 
after the entire chapter has been read. The "Table of Events 
and Dates," forming the appendix, should be consulted fre- 
quently, and pupils should be required to explain and elaborate 

iii 



iv Preface 

the brief statements there given concerning the significance of 
each dated event. Care ought also to be taken that pupils acquire 
a correct pronunciation of all proper names mentioned in the 
text and incorporated in the index and pronouncing vocabulary. 

Specific references in footnotes are made to the author's 
Readings in Ancient History, Readings in Medieval and Modem 
History, and Historical Source Book. The first two volumes 
contain sources of a narrative and biographical character; 
the third volume includes thirty-three documents ranging from 
Magna Carta to the Covenant of the League of Nations. These 
collections supply abundant material for outside reading, oral 
reports in class, and essays. 

The author desires once more to thank the cartographers, 
artists, and printers for their efficient cooperation with him 
in making this work. 

Hutton Webster 

Lincoln, Nebraska 
October, 1921 



CONTENTS 



List of Illustrations 
List of Maps .... 
List of Plates . . . ' . 
Suggestions for Further Study 



PAGE 

xi 

xv 

xviii 



II. 



CI- 
IO. 



13- 



Prehistoric Times 
i. Introductory 
2. Man's Place in Nature 

The Old Stone Age 

The New Stone Age 

The Age of Metals 

Races of Man . 

Languages of Man 
8. Writing and the Alphabet 

The Ancient Orient 

The Lands of the Near East . 
The Peoples of the Near East . 
Social Conditions 
Economic Conditions 
Commerce and Commercial Routes 

14. Law and Morality . . . 

15. Religion 

16. Literature and Art . 

17. Science 

18. Orient and Occident 



III. Greece 



19. 

20. 



23- 

24. 

25- 

26. 



The Lands of the West 
The Mediterranean Basin 
The ^Egeans 
The Greeks 
The Greek City-States 
Colonial Expansion of Greece 
The Persian Wars, 499-479 b.c 
Athens, 479-431 B.C. 
v 



15 
17 



23 



29 
32 
40 

44 
46 

49 
52 
55 
58 
62 

65 
68 

7i 
73 
79 
82 
84 
89 



VI 



Contents 



PAGE 

27. Athenian Culture . . . . . . -93 

28. Decline of the Greek City-States, 431-338 B.C. . 97 

29. Alexander the Great, and the Conquest of Persia 10 1 

30. The Hellenistic Age 105 



IV. 



V. 



VI. 



Rome 

31. Italian Peoples 

32. The Romans ..... i 

33. The Roman City-State .... 

34. Expansion of Rome over Italy, 5oa(?)-264 b.c 

35. Expansion of Rome beyond Italy, 264-133 B.C. 
Rome the Mistress of the Mediterranean Basin 
Decline of the Roman City-State, 133-31 B.C. 
The Early Empire, 31 B.C. -284 a.d. 
The World under Roman Rule 
Christianity in the Roman World 
The Later Empire, 284-476 a.d. 



36. 
37- 
38. 

39- 
40. 

4i. 



The Middle Ages 

42. The Germans .... 

43. The Holy Roman Empire 

44. The Northmen and the Normans 

45. Feudalism . 

46. The Byzantine Empire 

47. The Arabs and Islam, 622-1058 

48. The Crusades, 1095-1291 

49. Mongolian Peoples in Europe to 1453 

50. National States during the Later Middle Ages 

Medieval Civilization 

51. The Church 



52. The Clergy 

53. The Papacy 

54 Country Life 

Serfdom 

City Life 

Civic Industry • . 

Civic Trade ....... 

Cathedrals and Universities 

National Languages during the Later Middle Ages 



55- 
56. 
57- 
58. 
59- 
60. 



VII. The Renaissance 

61. Revival of Learning and Art in Italy . . 

62. Revival of Learning and Art beyond Italy 



112 

115 
119 
121 
123 
129 
132 
138 
144 
149 
i53 



157 
161 
166 
169 
176 
180 
187 
190 
194 



203, 
207 
211 
214 
219 
221 
225 
228 
231 
236 



240 
245 



■■■■<} 



*»./ 



Contents vii 



CHAFTEB 






PACE 


63. 


Geographical Discovery .,„... 


248 


64. 


Colonial Umpires .... 




253 


65. 


The Old World and the New . 




255 


66. 


The Protestant Reformation 




257 


67. 


The Protestant Sects 




263 


68. 


The Catholic Counter Reformat ion 




266 


69. 


The Religious Wars .... 




269 


70. 


The European State System 




278 


VIII. The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries in Europe 




71. 


Absolutism and the Divine Right of Kings 


281 


72. 


The Struggle against Stuart Absolutism in England 


282 


73- 


The Restoration and the "Glorious Revolution" 


291 


74- 


Absolutism of Louis XIV in France, 1643- 1715 


29S 


75- 


Russia under Peter the Great, 1689-1725 


302 


76. 


Russia under Catherine II, 1 762-1 796 


307 


77- 


Austria and Maria Theresa, 1 740-1 780 


309 


78. 


Prussia and Frederick the Great, 1 740-1 786 


3 l ° 


79- 


The Partitions of Poland, 1772-1795 




3H 



IX. Commerce and Colonies during the Seventeenth and 
Eighteenth Centuries 

80. Mercantilism and Trading Companies . . . 320 

81. The Dutch Colonial Empire . . . . .322 

82. Rivalry of France and England in India (to 1763) . 325 

83. Rivalry of France and England in North America 328 

84. The American Revolution, 17 76-1 783 . . . 334 

85. Formation of the United States .... 341 

86. Progress of Geographical Discovery . . . 342 

X. The Old Regime 

87. Reform 346 

88. The Privileged Classes 347 

89. The Unprivileged Classes 349 

90. The Church 331 

91. Liberal Ideas of Industry and Commerce; the 

Economists 354 

92. The Scientists 355 

93. Liberal Ideas of Religion and Politics; the English 

Philosophers 357 

94. The French Philosophers 359 

95. The Enlightened Despots 362 



Vlll 



Contents 



CHAPTER 

XI. 



The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era, i 789-181 5 

96. Eve of the French Revolution 

97. The Estates-General, 1789 

98. Outbreak of the French Revolution . 

99. The National Assembly, 1789-1791 

100. The First French Republic, 1792 

101. The National Convention, 1 792-1 795 

102. The Directory and Napoleon, 1795-1799 

103. The Consulate, 1799-1804 

104. The First French Empire, 1804 

105. Napoleon at War with Europe, 1805-1807 

106. Napoleon's Reorganization of Europe 

107. The Continental System . 

108. Revolt of the Nations, 1808-1814 

109. Downfall of Napoleon, 1814-1815 . 
no. "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" 



XII. The Democratic Movement in Europe, 181 5-1 848 
in. Modern Democracy 

112. The Congress of Vienna 

113. Restoration of the Dynasties .... 

114. Territorial Readjustments ... 

115. "Metternichismus" and the Concert of Europe 

116. France and the "July Revolution, " 1830 

117. The "July Revolution" in Europe 

118. The "February Revolution" and the Second French 

Republic, 1848 

119. The " February Revolution " in Europe 



XIII. The National Movement in Europe, i 848-1 871 

120. Modern Nationalism .... 

121. Napoleon III and the Second French Empire 

122. Disunited Italy 

123. Victor Emmanuel II and Cavour 

124. United Italy, 1859-1870 

125. Disunited Germany 

126. William I and Bismarck . 

127. United Germany, 1864-1871 



XIV. The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

128. Parliamentary Reform, 1832 

129. Political Democracy, 1832-1867 



468 
473 



Contents 



IX 



130. Political Democracy, 1867-1918 . 

i.-ji. Government of the United Kingdom 

132. The Irish Question 

133. The British Empire 

XV. The Continental Countries 

134. The Third French Republic 

135. Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Belgium 

136. Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, and 

Sweden ........ 

137. The German Empire, 1871-1918 . . . . 

138. The Dual Monarchy, 1867-1918 . 

130. The Russian Empire 

140. The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States . 



XVI: Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

141. Greater Europe 

142. The Opening-up of Africa 

143. The Partition of Africa 

144. The Opening-up and Partition of Asia 

145. India .... 

146. China .... 

147. Japan .... 

148. The Opening-up and Partition of Oceania 

149. Australia and New Zealand 

150. Canada .... 

151. Latin America 

152. The United States 

153. Close of Geographical Discovery 



XVII. The Industrial Revolution 

154. Modern Industrialism 

155. The Great Inventions 

156. Effects of the Great Inventions 

157. Improvements in Transportation 

158. Improved Communications 

159. Commerce .... 

160. Agriculture and Land Tenure . 

161. The Labor Movement 

162. Government Regulation of Industry 

163. Public Ownership 

[64. Socialism .... 

[65. Poverty and Progress 



PAGE 

477 
479 
486 
490 



5°5 

5io 
513 
519 
521 
529 



540 

542 
546 
550 
553 
555 
560 

563 
565 
566 
568 
573 
577 



58i 
583 
588 
592 
597 
600 
605 
609 
610 
614 
616 
620 



Contents 



CHAPTER 

XVIII. 



Modern Civilization 

166. Internationalism ..... 

167. Social Betterment ..... 

168. Emancipation of Women and Children 

169. Popular Education and the Higher Learning 

170. Religious Development .... 

171. Science ....... 

172. Literature . ... 

173. Music and the Fine Arts 



625 
628 
632 
634 
636 
641 
644 
646 



XIX. International Relations, 1871-1914 

174. The Triple Alliance 650 

175. The Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente . . 652 

176. Colonial Problems . 656 

177. The Eastern Question 658 

178. Militarism 661 

179. Pan-Germanism 665 



XX. The World War, 1914-1918 

180. Beginning of the War, 1914 

181. The Western Front .... 

182. The Eastern Front 

183. The Balkan and Italian Fronts 

184. The War outside of Europe and on the Sea, 

i9 J 7 

185. Intervention of the United States 

186. The Russian Revolution .... 

187. End of the War, 1918 .... 



1914- 



669 
674 
680 
682 

686 
690 
697 
700 



189. 
190. 



XXI. The World Settlement, 1919-1921 
188. The Peace Conference . . 
Peace with Germany 
Peace with Austria, Hungary, 
Turkey . . . . . 

191. The New Nations in Central Europe 

192. The New Nations in Eastern Europe 

193. Democracy and Socialism 

194. Economic Reconstruction 

195. The League of Nations 

Appendix — Table of Events and Dates 
Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary . 



Bulgaria, 



and 



707 
710 

7i3 
715 
717 
719 
723 
725 

73i 

737 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



PAGE 

The Heidelberg Lower Jaw . 6 
Spy Skull .... 7 
Prehistoric Stone Implements 8 
A Mammoth . . . . 10 
Head of a Girl . . . n 
Egyptian Neolithic Knives . 12 
Carved Menhir ... 13 
A Dolmen .... 14 
Prehistoric Iron Implements . 16 
Race Portraiture of the Egyp- 
tians ..... 20 
Symbolic Picture Writing . 23 
Chinese Picture Writing and 
Later Conventional Charac- 
ters 24 

Cretan Writing ... 26 
Egyptian and Babylonian 

Writing .... 27 
Head of Mummy of Rameses 

H 33 

A Philistine .... 35 
An Assyrian . . . -37 

An Assyrian Lion Hunt . . 38 

Darius with His Attendants . 30 

Court of the Pharaoh . . 41 
Tax Collecting in Ancient 

Egypt 42 

Transport of an Assyrian 

Colossus .... 43 
Plowing and Sowing in Ancient 

Egypt 44 

A Phoenician War Galley . 48 

The Judgment of the Dead . 40 
Babylonian Seal . . .50 

Hammurabi and the Sun God 51 

An Egyptian Scarab . . 52 
Amenotep IV . . . -53 







PAGE 


The Deluge Tablet . 


56 


Ancient Hebrew Manuscript 


57 


An Assyrian Palace (Restored) 


58 


Egyptian and Babylonian 




Numeration 


58 


A Babylonian Boundary Stone 


59 


Temple of Amon-Ra at Thebes 




(Restored) . 


61 


Hittite Warrior 




63 


"Throne of Minos" 




7i 


A Cretan Girl 




72 


The Swastika . 




75 


The Discus Thrower 




77 


An Athenian Trireme 




83 


A Scythian 




85 


Persian Archers 




87 


An Athenian Inscription 


9i 


Theater of Dionysus, Athens 


94 


An Athenian School 


95 


Pericles .... 


96 


Demosthenes . 


100 


Alexander the Great 


101 


The Alexander Mosaic . 


!°3 


.A Greek Cameo 


105 


Lighthouse of Alexandria 




(Restored) . 


106 


Suovetaurilia . 


117 


An Italian Plowman 


117 


Early Roman Bar Money 


118 


Curule Chair and Fasces 


119 


Carthaginian or Roman Hcl 




met .... 


126 


A Slave's Collar 




130 


Youth Reading a Papyru 


sRol 


J 3i 


A Roman Legionary 




i35 


A Testudo 




IS<> 


Roman Pontoon Bridge 




140 



Xll 



List of Illustrations 



Wall of Hadrian in Britain 


141 


Cross Section of Amiens 




The Amphitheater at Aries 


142 


Cathedral . 


233 


A Roman Freight Ship . 


143 


A Hornbook . 


234 


Gladiators . 


146 


Tower of Magdalen College 




A Roman Aqueduct 


147 


Oxford 


235 


Interior of the Catacombs 


150 


A University Lecture 


236 


Charlemagne . 


162 


Mask of Dante 


241 


Ring Seal of Otto the Great . 


164 


An Early Printing Press 


242 


A Viking Ship 


167 


Desiderius Erasmus 


245 


A Scene from the Bayeux 




William Shakespeare 


246 


Tapestry . 


168 


The Santa Maria, Flagship 0: 




The Tower of London . 


173 


Columbus . 


252 


Mounted Knight . 


175 


Martin Luther 


258 


Naval Battle Showing Use o: 




Worms Cathedral . 


260 


"Greek Fire" 


178 


St. Ignatius Loyola 


266 


Mecca .... 


181 


The Spanish Armada in the 




The Alhambra 


185 


English Channel . 


273 


Combat between Crusaders 




Henry IV 


2 74 


and Moslems 


188 


Henry VIII . 


276 


Ef3fig3 7 of a Knight Templar 


189 


Hugo Grotius 


278 


Hut-Wagon of the Mongols 




A Puritan Family . 


284 


(Reconstruction) 


191 


Specimen of Cromwell's Hand- 




A Mongol 


192 


writing 


287 


Mohammed II 


193 


Great Seal of Engjand under 




Coronation Chair, Westmin- 




the Commonwealth 


289 


ster Abbey . 


196 


Hotel des Invalides, Paris 


296 


Religious Music 


205 


Marlborough 


300 


A Bishop Ordaining a Priest 


207 


Gibraltar 


301 


Abbey of Saint-Germain des 




Catherine II . 


307 


Pres, Paris . 


209 


Maria Theresa 


310 


Papal Arms . 


211 


The Partition of Poland . 


3i7 


Sulgrave Manor 


214 


New Amsterdam in 1655 


324 


Farm Work in the Fourteenth 


L 


Quebec .... 


333 


Century 


2l8 


A Stamp of 1765 . 


335 


Serf Warming his Hands 


2 20 


George III 


336 


House of Jacques Cceur 




Opening Lines of the Declara 




Bourges 


223 


tion of Independence . 


• 337 


Belfry of Bruges 


224 


Signatures of the Treaty 


f 


A German Merchant in thf 




Paris, 1783 . 


34o 


Fourteenth Century . 


. 226 


John Wesley . 


• 352 


Jacob Fugger . 


229 


Boys' Sports . 


• 353 


Baptistery, Cathedral, anc 


1 


Adam Smith . 


• 355 


"Leaning Tower" of Pisa 


• 232 


Death Maskof Sir Isaac Newtoi 


1 356 



List of Illustrations 



Xlll 





F VG1 


Voltaire 


360 


Rousseau . 


3O1 


Joseph 11 ... . 


3»4 


Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, 




and the Dauphin 


368 


Turgot 


309 


Costumes of the Orders . 


371 


Mirabeau . . . . 


372 


The Storming of the Bastile 


374 


The Destruction of Feudalism 


376 


An Assignat . 


377 


Robespierre . 


382 


The Lion of Lucerne 


383 


Napoleon's Birthplace, Ajaccic 


388 


Cross of the Legion of Honor 


393 


A Napoleonic Medal 


394 


The Victory . 


395 


The Duke of WeHington 


401 


The Tomb of Napoleon . 


406 


Seal of the French Republic 


407 


Arc de Triomphe, Paris . 


422 


Louis Philippe 


425 


Facsimile of Article VII of the 




Treaty of 1839 . 


428 


La Madeleine, Paris 


433 


Caricature of Louis Philippe 


434 


Medal in Honor of Kossuth 


436 


The Louvre and the Tuileries 


443 


" France is Tranquil" 


• 445 


Napoleon III and Eugenie 


• 446 


Mazzini .... 


449 


Victor Emmanuel II 


• 45° 


"The Right Leg in the Boot a 


t 


Last" .... 


• 455 


William I 


• 459 


"VaeVictis" . 


. 466 


The Union Jack 


• 469 


Canvassing for Votes 


• 470 


Queen Victoria 


• 474 


Windsor Castle 


• 475 


[nterior of the House of Com 




mons .... 


. 481 


House of Commons Mace 


• 483 



No. 10, Downing Street . 

St. Paul's Cathedral, London 

Notre Dame, Paris 

The Pantheon, Paris 

Chamber of Deputies, Paris 

The Vatican, Rome 

The Reichstagsgebiiude, Berlin 

The German National Monu- 
ment .... 

Francis Joseph I 

The Kremlin, Moscow . 

Nicholas I 

Church of the Resurrection o 
Christ, Petrograd 

"What Nicholas Heard in the 
Shell" 

Florence Nightingale 

David Livingstone . 

Henry M. Stanley . 

Cecil Rhodes . 

Count Ferdinand de Lesseps 

"The Lion's Vengeance on the 
Bengal Tiger" 

The Great Wall of China 

Empress-Dowager of China 

Simon Bolivar 

The Christ of the Andes 

Robert E. Peary 

A Spinning Wheel . 

Arkwright's Spinning Wheel 

Cart wright's First Power 
Loom .... 

Whitney's Cotton Gin . 

An Eighteenth-century Stage 
coach .... 

The Clermont, 1807 

The Rocket, 1830 . 

A Precursor of the Automobile 

Morse's First Telegraph In- 
strument, 1837 . 

The Original Atlantic Cable . 
First Adhesive Penny Postage 
Stamp . 



597 
598 

599 



XIV 



List of Illustrations 







PAGE 




PAGE 


The First Copy of the 


New 




King Albert I 


673 


York Sun . 




599 


British Recruiting Poster 


674 


The Stock Exchange, New York 60 1 


Sir Douglas Haig . 


678 


McCormick Reaper, 1834 




606 


"Kultur Has Passed Here" . 


679 


The Earl of Shaftesbury 




612 


Hindenburg .... 


680 


Robert Owen . 




617 


The Victoria Cross 


683 


Karl Marx 




619 


The Iron Cross 


683 


Spinning and Weaving in 


the 




Eleutherios Venizelos 


684 


Middle Ages 




624 


"The Last Crusade" 


68; 


"Ridiculous Taste, or 


the 




The Lusitania . . ' . 


690 


Ladies' Absurdity" 




626 


The German Lusitania Medal 


69 


Elizabeth Fry 




630 


The United States Declaration 




A Lunatic 




630 


of War . 


692 


William Booth 




631 


Herbert Hoover 


695 


Susan B. Anthony . 




633 


Eric von Ludendorff 


701 


Sir Charles Lyell . 




642 


Ferdinand Foch 


702 


Victor Hugo . 




646 


John J. Pershing 


703 


Mozart's Spinet 




647 


Versailles .... 


708 


Ludwig van Beethoven . 




647 


Signatures of the Peace with 




"Dropping the Pilot" . 




652 


Germany .... 


711 


"The Blessings of Peace" 




662 


David Lloyd George 


728 


Nicholas II . 




664 


Woodrow Wilson . 


72Q 



LIST OF MAPS 



Europe in the Ice Age 

Races of Man ....... 

Distribution of Semitic and Indo-European Peoples 
Physical Asia (double page) .... 

The Ancient Orient (double page) 

Solomon's Kingdom ...... 

Colonization of the Mediterranean 

Physical Features of Europe (double page) 

Racial Types in Western Europe .... 

The Mediterranean Basin 

Greek Conquests and Migrations .... 

The Persian Invasions of Greece .... 

The Athenian Empire at its Height .... 

Growth of Macedonia ...... 

(i) Empire of Alexander (2) Kingdoms of his Successors 

The World according to Ptolemy 

The .Etolian and Achaean Leagues (about 229 B.C.) . . . . 

Distribution of the Early Inhabitants of Italy . 

Rome in Italy ......... Facing 

Rome and Carthage at the Beginning of the Second Punic War . 
Roman Empire at its Greatest Extent (double page) 

Between 138 and 

St. Paul's Travels 

Prefectures of the Roman Empire about 395 

Europe at Deposition of Romulus Augustulus, 476 . . Facing 



Between 28 and 
Between 34 and 

Facing 
Between 64 and 



Facing 

Facing 



Facing 

Facing 

Eleventh Centuries . 
Facing 

Facing 



Teutonic Migrations and Conquests 
Europe in the Age of Charlemagne, 800 
Europe in the Age of Otto the Great, 962 
The Byzantine Empire during the Tenth and 
Expansion of Islam .... 
Asia under the Mongols 
The British Isles during the Middle Ages 

Unification of France during the Middle Ages 

Unification of Spain during the Middle Ages 

Growth of Christianity from the Fifth to the Fourteenth Century 
(double page) ...... Between 204 and 

Plan of Ilitchin Manor, Hertfordshire 

Trade Routes between Northern and Southern Europe 

xv 



PAGE 

4 
19 
22 
29 
35 
36 
46 

65 
67 

70 

74 
86 
90 

99 
104 
108 
109 

113 
122 

125 

139 
152 
155 
156 
160 
162 
165 
177 
184 
192 

195 
198 
200 

205 
215 
230 



xvi List of Maps 

PAGE 

Behaim's Globe 250 

Portuguese and Spanish Colonial Empires in the Sixteenth Century 

(double page) Between 254 and 255 

Extent of the Reformation, 1524-1572 ...... 264 

The Netherlands at the Truce of 1609 271 

Europe at the End of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 . . Facing 278 

Acquisitions of Louis XIV and Louis XV 298 

Europe after the Peace of Utrecht, 1 713 .... Facing 300 

Growth of Russia to the End of the Eighteenth Century . . . 303 

The Ottoman Empire to 1683 Facing 308 

Growth of Prussia to the End of the Eighteenth Century . Facing 314 

Partitions of Poland, 1772, 1793, 1795 316 

English Trading Companies Facing 322 

India 326 

North America after the Peace of Paris, 1783 339 

Colonial Empires in the Eighteenth Century (double page) 

Between 344 and 345 

Europe at the Beginning of the French Revolution . . Facing 366 

Revolutionary France and Italy ...... Facing 388 

First French Empire, 1812 ...... Facing 398 

Theater of the Waterloo Campaign 405 

Europe after the Congress of Vienna, 18 15 . . . Facing 416 

The Netherlands in the Nineteenth Century 427 

Poland in the Nineteenth Century 429 

Unification of Italy, 1815-1870 454 

The Germanic Confederation, 181 5— 1866 .... Facing 45 S 

Unification of Germany, 1815-1871 Facing 462 

Alsace-Lorraine 465 

Ireland 486 

Growth of the British Empire . . . ... . Facing 490 

The British Empire Between 494 and 495 

The Hapsburg Dominions, 12 73-19 14 .... Facing 520 
Russia in Europe during the Nineteenth Century . . . .524 

The Ottoman Empire, 1683-1914 Facing 530 

Balkan States in 1878 and 1913 Facing 538 

The World Powers, 181 5 Facing 540 

Peoples of Africa v . 543 

Religions of Africa 545 

Exploration and Partition of Africa (double page) Between 548 and 549 

The Peoples of Asia Facing 552 

The European Advance in Asia (double page) . Between 554 and 555 

Expansion of Buddhism 556 

The World Powers (double page) . . . Between 560 and 561 



List of Maps 



XVII 



The Pacific Ocean Facing 

Exclusion of Spain and Portugal from South America . Facing 

Relief Map of the Panama Canal 

North America since 1783 Facing 

Discoveries of the Polar Regions 

Economic Europe (double page) . . . Between 582 and 

Industrial England in the Twentieth Century 

Occupations of Mankind • Facing 

Commercial Development of the World (double page) 

Between 604 and 
Facing 
Facing 



Facing 

Facing 



Density of the World's Population 

Languages of the World 

Religions of the World 

Europe in 1871 . 

Berlin-to-Bagdad Railway . 

Europe in 1914 . 

Plan of the Battle of the Marne 

The Western Front 

The Eastern Front 

The Italian Front 

German Barred Zone . 

North Sea Mine Fields 

The World War in 1918 

Europe after the Peace Conference at Paris (double page) 

Between 714 and 
The Peoples of Europe at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century 
(double page) ■ . Between 718 and 



PAGE 

564 
57o 
575 
576 
579 
583 
5«° 
592 

605 
620 
626 

637 
650 
658 
666 
676 
677 
681 
685 
689 
694 
696 

7i5 
719 



LIST OF PLATES 

PAGE 

Stonehenge Facing 12 

Great Pyramid of Gizeh . . . 56 

Hermes and Dionysus 80 

Temple of Poseidon at Paestum 81 

The Acropolis of Athens (Restoration) 94 

Acropolis of Athens from the Southwest 95 

Julius Caesar 136 

Augustus Caesar 136 

The Palace of the Caesars 142 

The Roman Forum at the Present Time 143 

Oriental, Greek, and Roman Coins . . . . . 148 

Ancient and Medieval Gems ........ 149 

Rheinstein Castle 176 

Sancta Sophia, Constantinople 177 

St. Peter's, Rome . . .212 

Campanile and Doge's Palace, Venice 230 

Reims Cathedral . . . . . . . . . .231 

Italian Paintings of the Renaissance 244 

Philip II 272 

Elizabeth „ .273 

Oliver Cromwell 286 

Louis XIV 302 

Peter the Great 303 

Frederick the Great 310 

Napoleon as First Consul 390 

"1807" 391 

The Congress of Vienna, 1814-1815 414 

Prince Metternich . . .415 

Cavour 452 

Garibaldi . 452 

Bismarck 460 

Moltke 460 

Gladstone 476 

Disraeli 476 

Houses of Parliament, London 482 

Choir of Westminster Abbey ........ 483 

Thiers . 494 

xviii 



List of Plates 



XIX 



Gambetta 

The Congress of Berlin, 1878 
Constantinople and the Bosporus 
Benjamin Watt . 

Robert Fulton . 

Early Passenger Trains 

Charles Darwin . 

Louis Pasteur 

Inimanucl Kant . 

Herbert Spencer . 

View of Paris from an Airplane 

The Peace Conference, 1919 



PACK 

Facing 404 

53" 
537 
588 
588 

5«0 
644 
644 
645 
645 
710 
711 



SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY 

All serious students of history should have access to the American 

Historical Review (N. Y., 1895 to date, quarterly, $4.00 a year). This 

. . journal, the organ of the American Historical Association, 

contains articles by scholars, critical reviews of all impor- 
tant works, and notes and news. The Historical Outlook (formerly the 
History Teacher's Magazine) is edited under the supervision of a com- 
mittee of the American Historical Association (Philadelphia, 1909 to 
date, monthly, $2.00 a year). Every well-equipped school library 
should contain the files of the National Geographic Magazine (Washing- 
ton, 1890 to date, monthly, $3.50 a year) and of Art and Archaology 
(Washington, 1914 to date, monthly, $4.00 a year). These two periodi- 
cals make a special feature of illustrations. Current History (N. Y., 
1914 to date, monthly, $4.00 a year) contains many of the valuable 
articles appearing in the daily edition of the New York Times, as well 
as much additional matter of contemporary interest. 

Useful books for the teacher's library include H. E. Bourne, The 
Teaching of History and Civics in the Elementary and the Secondary 

School (N. Y., 1902, Longmans, Green & Co., $1.90), 
Works on the Henry Johnson, The Teaching of History (N. Y., 1915, 
teachingof Macmillan, $1.80), H. B. George, Historical Evidence 
history (N- Y., 1909, Oxford University Press, American Branch, 

$1.80), J. H. Vincent, Historical Research (N. Y., 1911, 
Holt, $4.00), Frederic Harrison, The Meaning of History and Other His- 
torical Pieces (new ed., N. Y., 1900, Macmillan, $2.50), J. H. Robinson, 
The New History (N. Y., 191 2, Macmillan, $2.00), and H. B. George, 
The Relations of History and Geography (4th ed., N. Y., 1910, Oxford 
University Press, American Branch, $2.25). The following reports are 
indispensable : 

The Study of History in Schools. Report to the American Historical Association 

by the Committee of Seven (N. Y., 1899, Macmillan, $1.00). 
The Study of History in Secondary Schools. Report to the American Historical 

Association by a Committee of Five (N. Y., 1911, Macmillan, $1.00). 
Historical Sources in Schools. Report to the New England History Teachers' 

Association by a Select Committee (N. Y., 1902, out of print). 
A History Syllabus for Secondary Schools. Report by a Special Committee of the 

New England History Teachers' Association (N. Y., 1904, Heath, $1.60). 

xx 



Suggestions for Further Study xxi 

A Bibliography Oj History for Schools and Libraries. Published under the- auspices 
of the Association of History Teachers of the Middle States and Maryland 
(jd ed., N. Y ., 1915, Longmans, Green & Co., <>o cents). 

For chronology, genealogies, lists of sovereigns, and other data the 
nii>:U valuable works are Arthur Hassall, European History, 476-1920 
(new ed., N. Y., 1920, Macmillan, $4.00), G. P. Putnam, 
Tabular Vines of Universal History (new ed., N. Y., Dictionaries 
1915, Putnam, $3-0°), and K. J. Ploetz, A Handbook of encyc i p e dias 
Universal History, translated by W. H. Tillinghast (new 
ed., Boston, 1915, Houghton Mifflin Co., $3.75). TheNew International 
War Book (N. Y., 1907 to date, Dodd, Mead & Co.) is an annual encyclo- 
pedia and compendium of the world's progress. The Statesman's Year 
Book (N. Y., Macmillan, $7.50) and the American Year Book (N. Y., Ap- 
pleton, S5.00) are other annual publications devoted to current history. 

An admirable collection of maps for school use is W. R. Shepherd, 
Historical Atlas (N. Y\, 191 1, Holt, temporarily out of print), with 
about two hundred and fifty maps covering the historical 
field. Other valuable works are E. W. Dow, Atlas of 
European History (N. Y\, 1907, Holt, $2.50), Ramsay Muir, Hammond's 
flew Historical Atlas for Students (2d ed., N. Y., 1914, Hammond, 
S4.00), and C. G. Robertson and J. G. Bartholomew, An Historical 
Atlas of Modern Europe from 17S9 to 1914 (N. Y., 1915, Oxford Univer- 
sity Press, American* Branch, $2.50). Much use can be made of the 
Literary and Historical Atlas of Europe, by J. G. Bartholomew, in " Every- 
man's Library " (N. Y., 1910, Dutton, $1.00). Other atlases in the same 
collection are devoted to Asia, Africa and Australasia, and America, 
respectively. Very valuable, also, is J. G. Bartholomew, An Atlas of 
Economic Geography (N. Y., 1915, Oxford University Press, American 
Branch, S3.40) with maps showing temperature, rainfall, population, 
races, occupations, religions, trade routes, products, etc. A similar 
though less extensive work is Hammond's Business Atlas of Economic 
Geography (N. Y., 1920, Llammond, $2.00). 

A series of European History maps, forty-four in number, size 48J X 
38} inches, has been prepared for ancient history by Hutton Webster 
and for medieval and modern history by Hutton Webster, 
D. C. Knowlton, and C. D. Hazen (Chicago, A. J. Ny- ^"charts 
strom & Co., complete set with tripod stand $86. 00; in 
spring roller cases $176.00). These maps may also be had separately. 
The maps in this series are on a very large scale, omit all irrelevant 
detail, present place names in the modern English form, and deal with 
cultural as well as with political subjects. A somewhat similar series of 
wall maps, forty three in Dumber, size 44X32 inches, is the work of 
*. H. Breasted, C. F. Huth, and S. i>. Harding (Chicago, Dcnoyer- 
Geppert Co., complete set with tripod stand, $72.00; in spring roller 



xxii Suggestions for Further Study 

cases, $203.00). The school should also possess good physical wall 

maps such as the Sydow-Habenicht or the Kiepert series, both to be 

obtained from Rand, McNally & Co. The text is in German. Philip's 

Physical Maps and Johnston's New Series of Physical Wall Maps are 

obtainable from A. J. Nystrom & Co. The only large charts available 

are those prepared by MacCoun for his Historical Geography Charts of 

Europe. The two sections, " Ancient and Classical " and "Medieval 

and Modern," are sold separately (N. Y., Silver, Burdett & Co., $20.00). 

The " Studies " following each chapter of this book include various 

exercises for which small outline maps are required. Such maps are 

„ ,. sold by D. C. Heath & Co., Boston, New York, Chicago. 

Outline maps TT . , , . T . ° 

Usetui atlases 01 outline maps are also to be had of the 

McKinley Publishing Co., Philadelphia ; A. J. Nystrom & Co., Chicago ; 

Atkinson, Mentzer & Grover, Chicago, and of other publishers. A 

very useful work is Bishop and Robinson, Practical Map Exercises in 

Medieval and Modem European History (Boston, Ginn & Co.) 

The best photographs of works of art must usually be obtained from 

foreign publishers or from their American agents. In addition to 

photographs and lantern slides, a collection of stereoscopic 
Illustrations F . ° . F , . , ... ..'.., ■ , . . /. 

views is very helpful in giving vividness and interest to 

instruction in history. An admirable series of photographs for the 
stereoscope is issued by Underwood and Underwood, New York City. 
The same firm supplies convenient maps and handbooks for use in this 
connection. The Keystone stereographs, prepared by the Keystone 
View Company, Meadville, Penn., may also be cordially recommended. 
Notable collections are Lehmann's Geographical Pictures, Historical 
Pictures, and Types of Nations, and Cybulski's Historical Pictures 
(Chicago, A. J. Nystrom & Co., and Denoyer-Geppert Co. ; each 
picture separately mounted on rollers). The Illustrated Topics for An- 
cient History and Illustrated Topics for Medieval and Modern History, 
arranged by D. C. Knowlton (Philadelphia, McKinley Publishing Co., 
each 65 cents), contain much valuable material in the shape of a syllabus, 
outline maps, pictures, and other aids. 

To vitalize the study of geography and history there is nothing better 
Works of than the reading of modern books of travel. Among 

travel these may be mentioned : 

Allinson, F. G., and Allinson, Anne C. E., Greek Lands and Letters (Boston, 1909, 

Houghton Mifflin Co., $2.50). An entertaining work of mingled history and 

geography. 
Clark,F.E. TheHoly Land of Asia Minor (N.Y. ,1914, Scribner, $1.25). Popular 

sketches. 
Dwight, H. G. Constantinople, Old and New (N. Y., 1915, Scribner, $5.00). 
Forman, H. J. The Ideal Italian Tour (Boston, 1911, Houghton Mifflin Co., $3.00). 

A brief and attractive volume covering all Italy. 



Suggestions for Further Study xxiii 

Jackson, V V. W-. Persia, Past and Present (N. Y., 1906, Macmillan, S4.00). 
Kini.i aki;, A. W. Eotken (,N T . Y., 1844, Dulton, $1.00). Sketches of travel in the 

East. 
Taylor, Bayard. Views A-Foot (N. Y., 1855, Putnam, $1.50). A classic work of 

European travel. 
Warner, C. D. /;; the Levant (N. Y., Harper, 1876, out of print). 

The following works of historical fiction comprise only a selection 
from a very large number of hooks suitable for supplementary reading. 
For extended bibliographies see E. A. Baker, A Guide to 
Historical Fiction, and Jonathan Nield, A Guide to the ~ . 
Best Historical Novels and Talcs. An excellent list of 
historical stories, especially designed for children, will be found in the 
Bibliography of History for Schools and Libraries, parts viii-ix. 

Bl\ck\iore, R. D. Lorna Doone (1869). Monmouth's Rebellion, 1685. 

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward. The Last Days of Pompeii (1834). 

Cox, G. W. Tales of Ancient Greece (1868). 

Dickens, Charles. The Tale of Two Cities (1859). London and Paris at the time 

of the French Revolution. 
Eliot, George. Romola (1863). Florence in the latter part of the fifteenth 

century. 
Hugo, Victor. Ninety-Three (1872). Insurrection in La Vendee, 1793. 

Notre Dame de Paris (1831). Paris, late fifteenth century. 

Irving, Washington. The Alhambra (1832). Sketches of the Moors and Span- 
iards. 
Kixgsley, Charles. Hypatia (1853). Alexandria, 391 a.d. 

Westward Ho! (1855). Voyages of Elizabethan seamen and the struggle 

with Spain. 

Kipling, Rudyard. Puck of Pook's Hill (1906). Roman occupation of Britain. 
Lever, Charles. Charles O'Malley (1841). The Peninsular War. 

Tom Bourke of "Ours" (1848). French wars of the Consulate and 

Empire. 

Reade, Charles. The Cloister and the Hearth (1861). Eve of the Ref- 
ormation. 
Scott, (Sir) Walter. The Talisman (1825). Reign of Richard I, 1193. 

Ivanhoe (1820). Richard I, 1 194. 

Shorthouse, J. H. John Inglcsant (1881). Life in England and Italy during the 

seventeenth century. 
Sienkiewicz, Henryk. With Fire and Sword (1884). Poland in the seventeenth 

century. 
Thackeray, W. M. Henry Esmond (1852). England during the reigns of William 

III and Queen Anne. 
Tolstoy, (Count) L. N. War and Peace (1864-1869). Napoleon's campaigns in 

Russia. 

Sevastopol (1855-1856). Crimean War. 

Wallace, Lew. Ben Eur; a Talc of the Christ (1880). 
Waterloo, Stanley. The Story of Ab (1905). Prehistoric life. 



xxiv Suggestions for Further Study 

It is unnecessary to emphasize the value, as collateral reading, of 
Historical historical poems and plays. To the brief list which 

poetry follows should be added the material in Katharine Lee 

Bates and Katharine Coman, English History told by English Poets. 

Brooke, Rupert, The Soldier. 

Browning, Elizabeth B. The Cry of the Children, and The Forced Recruit. 

Browning, Robert. Pheidippides, Herve Riel, and An Incident of the French 

Camp. 
Burns, Robert. The Battle of Bannockburn. 
Byron (Lord). Song of Saul before His Last Battle, The Destruction of Sennacherib, 

Belshazzar's Feast, The Isles of Greece (Don Juan, canto iii, between stanzas 

86-87), "The Eve of Waterloo" (Childe Harold, canto iii, stanzas 21-28), and 

Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte. 
Campbell, Thomas. Hohenlinden, The Battle of the Baltic, Rule Britannia, and 

Ye Mariners of England. 
Cowper, William. Loss of the "Royal George." 
Domett, Alfred. A Christmas Hymn. 
Dryden, John. Alexander's Feast. 
Halleck, Fitz-Greene. Marco Bozzaris. 
Hemans, Felicia. The Landing of the Pilgrims. 
Kipling, Rudyard. Recessional, and The White Man's Burden. 
Longfellow, H. W. The Skeleton in Armor, The Norman Baron, The Belfry of 

Bruges, Nuremberg, and The White Czar. 
Lowell, J. R. Kossuth, and Villafrajica. 
Macaulay, T. B. Lays of Ancient Rome, The Armada, The Battle of Ivry, and The 

Battle of Naseby. 
McCeae, John. In Flanders Fields. 
Markham, Edwin. The Mam with the Hoe. 
Miller, Joaquin. Columbus. 
Milton, John. Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity, and To the Lord General 

Cromwell. 
Morris, William. The Day is Coming. 
Norton, Caroline E. S. The Soldier from Bingen. 
Rossetti, D. G. The White Ship. 
Schiller, Friedrich. The Maid of Orleans, William Tell, Maria Stuart, and 

W aliens tein. 
Scott, (Sir) Walter. "Flodden Field" {Marmion, canto vi, stanzas 19-27,33- 

35)- 
Shakespeare, William. Coriolanus, Julius Ccesar, Antony and Cleopatra, King 

John, Richard the Second, Henry the Fourth, parts i and ii, Henry the Fifth, 

Henry the Sixth, parts i, ii, and iii, Richard the Third, Henry the Eighth, and 

The Merchant of Venice. 
Taylor, Bayard. The Song in Camp. 
Tennyson, Alfred. Ulysses, Boadicea, St. Telemachus, St. Simeon Stylites, Sir 

Galahad, " The Revenge" : A Ballad of the Fleet, Ode on the Death of the Duke of 

Wellington, The Charge of the Light Brigade, and The Defense of Lucknow. 
Thackeray, W. M. King Canute. 
Wolfe, Charles. The Burial of Sir John Moore. 



Suggestions for Further Study xxv 

Full information regarding the best translations of the sources of 
history may be found in one of the Reports previously 
cited — Historical Sources in Schools, parts iii-iv. The 
use of the following collections of extracts from the sources will go far 
toward remedying the lack of library facilities. 

Botsford, G. W., and Botsford, Lillie S. Source Book of Ancient History (N. Y., 

1912, Macmillan, S2.00). 
Davis, W. S. Readings in Ancient History (Boston, 1912, Allyn & Bacon, 2 vols., 

$2.80). 
I In. 1 , Mabel. Liberty Documents (N. Y., 1001, out of print). 
Ogg, F. A. A Source Book of Medieval History (N. Y., 1907,' American Book Co., 

S1.72). 
ROBINSON, J. H. Readings in European History (abridged cd., Boston, 1906, Ginn, 

$2.50). 
Webster, IIutton. Readings in Ancient History (N. Y., 1913, Heath, $1.60). 
■ Readings in Medieval and Modern History (N. Y., 1917, Heath, $1.60). 

Historical Source Book (N. Y., 1920, Heath, $1.60). 

Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History (N. Y., 
1894-1899, Longmans, Green & Co., 6 vols., each $2.00). 

Most of the books in the following list are inexpensive, easily procured 
and well adapted in style and choice of topics to the needs of high-school 
pupils. Some more advanced and costly works are in- 
dicated by an asterisk (*). For detailed bibliographies, . 
often accompanied by critical estimates, see C. K. Adams, 
A Manual of Historical Literature, and the Bibliography of History for 
Schools and Libraries, parts iii-v. 

GENERAL 

♦Abbott, W. C. The Expansion of Europe, 1415-17S0 (N. Y., 1918, Holt, 2 vols., 

S8.00). Emphasizes cultural aspects of modern European history. 
Beard, C. A. Introduction to the English Historians (N. Y., 1906, Macmillan, S3. 50). 

A book of selected readings. 
Carlyle, Thomas. On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (N. Y., 

1840, Button, Si. 00). 
Chapin, F. S. An Historical Introduction to Social Economy (N. Y., 1917, Century 

Co., S3. 00). An elementary treatment of industrial and social history. 
Cheyney, E. P. Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England (rev. 

ed., N. Y., 1920, Macmillan, $2.60). 
Cowan, A. R. Master Clues in World History (N. Y., 1914, Longmans, Green & 

Co., S2.00). Suggestive reading. 
CREASY, E. S. The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World from Marathon to Waterloo 

(X. V., 1854, Button, Si. 00). 
Cunningham, William. An Essay on Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects 

(Ancient Times) (X. V., 1898, Putnam, $1.35). Cambridge Historical Series. 

An E^say on Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects (Medieval and 

Modem Times) (N. Y., 1901, Putnam, $1.35). Cambridge Historical Scries. 



xxvi Suggestions for Further Study 

Day, Clive. A History of Commerce (2d ed., N. Y., 1914, Longmans, Green & Co., 

$2.50). The most scholarly treatment in English. 
Ellwood, C. A. Sociology and Modern Social Problems (N. Y., iqio, American 

Book Co., $1.48). An elementary treatment. 
Goodyear, W. H. Roman and Medieval Art (2d ed., N. Y., 1897, Macmillan, $2.00). 

Renaissance and Modem Art (N. Y., 1894, $2.00). 

*Hayes, C. J. H. A Political and Social History of Modern Europe (N. Y., 1916, 

Macmillan, 2 vols., $7.75). A college text-book, covering the period 1500-1915 ; 

provided with full bibliographies. 
Herbertson, A. J., and Herbertson, F. D. Man and His Work (3d ed., N. Y., 

1914, Macmillan, $1.28). An introduction to the study of human geography. 
Herrick, C. A, History of Commerce and Industry (N. Y., 1917, Macmillan, $2.00). 
Jacobs, Joseph. The Story of Geographical Discovery (N. Y., 1898, Appleton, $1.00). 
Jenks, Edward. The State and the Nation (N. Y., 1919, Dutton, $2.00). A simply 

written work on the historical development of social institutions. 
Kelsey, Carl. The Physical Basis of Society (N. Y., 1916, Appleton, $2.50). An 

interesting introduction to the study of sociology. 
Kerr, P. H., and Kerr, A. C. The Growth of the British Empire (N. Y., 191 1, 

Longmans, Green & Co., $1.00). 
Libby, Walter. An Introduction to the History of Science (Boston, 1917, Houghton 

Mifflin Co., $2.35). 
Macy, Jesse, and Gannaway, J. W. Comparative Free Government (N. Y., 191 5, 

Macmillan, $3.25). 
Marvin, F. S. The Living Past (2d ed., N. Y., 1915, Oxford University Press, 

American Branch, $2.00). Thoughtful survey of intellectual history. 
*Monroe, Paul. A Textbook in the History of Education (N. Y., 1905, Macmillan, 

$3-5o). 
Myers, P. V. N. History as Past Ethics (Boston, 1913, Ginn, $1.50). 
Pattison, R. P. D. Leading Figures in European History (N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, 

$2.00). Biographical sketches of European statesmen from Charlemagne to 

Bismarck. 
Powers, H. H. Mornings with Masters of Art (N. Y., 1912, out of print). Christian 

art from the time of Constantine to the death of Michelangelo. 
Quennel, Marjorie, and Quennel, C. H. B. A History of Everyday Things in 

England (N. Y., 1919, Scribner, 2 vols., each $4.00). Covers the period between 

1066 and 1799; a charmingly written and amply illustrated work. 
Reinach, Salomon. Apollo; an Illustrated Manual of the History of Art throughout 

the Ages, translated by Florence Simmonds (last ed., N. Y., 1914, Scribner, 

$2.00). The best work on the subject. 
Seignobos, Charles. History of Ancient Civilization, edited by J. A. James (N. Y., 

igo6, Scribner, $1.48). 

History of Medieval and Modern Civilisation, edited by J. A. James (N. Y., 

1907, Scribner, $1.48). 

History of Contemporary Civilization, edited by J. A. James (N. Y., 1909, 



Scribner, $1.48). 
*Wells, H. G. The Outline of History (N. Y., 1920, Macmillan, 2 vols., $10.50). 
*Wilson, Woodrow. The State. Elements of Historical and Practical Politics (2d 

ed., N. Y., 1898, Heath, $2.68). 



Suggestions for Further Study xxvii 



PREHISTORIC TIMES 

Clodd, Edward. The Story of Primitive Man (N. Y., 1895, Applcton, 50 cents). 
.\h res, J. L. The Dawn of History (N. Y., 1912, Holt, 90 cents). Home University 

Library. 
•Osborn, H. F. Men of the Old Stone Age (N. Y., 1915, Scribner, $5.00). An 

authoritative, interesting, and amply illustrated work. 
Sr\RR, FREDERICK. Some First Steps in Human Progress (Chautauqua, N. Y., 

1 895, out of print). A popular introduction to anthropology. 
Tvlor, (Sir) E. B. Anthropology (N. Y., 1881, Appleton, $3.00). Incorporates 

the results of the author's extensive studies. 

THE ANCIENT ORIENT 

Baikie, James. The Story of the Pharaohs (N. Y., 190S, Macmillan, $4.25). A 
popular work; well illustrated. 

*Brf.asted, J. H. A History of Egypt from the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest 
(2d ed., N. Y., 1909, Scribner, $7.00). The standard work on Egyptian history. 

Clay, A. T. Light on the Old Testament from Babel (4th ed., Philadelphia, 1915, 
Sunday School Times Co., $2.00). 

*Erman, Adolf. Life in Ancient Egypt (N. Y., 1894, out of print). 

Grant, Elihu. The Orient in Bible Times (Philadelphia, ig2o, Lippincott, $2.50). 

*Hall, H. R. Ancient History of the Near East (N. Y., 1913, Macmillan, S7.00). 

Hogarth, D. G. The Ancient East (N. Y., 1915, Holt, 90 cents). Home Uni- 
versity Library. 

*Jastrow, Morris. The Civilization of Babylonia and Assyria (Philadelphia, 
1915, Lippincott, $7.50). A finely illustrated work by a great scholar. 

Maspero, (Sir) Gaston. Life in Ancient Egypt and Assyria (N. Y., 1892, Apple- 
ton, $2.50). Fascinating and authoritative. 

GREECE AND ROME 

Baikie, James. The Sea-Kings of Crete (2d ed., N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, $4.25). 

A clear and vivid summary of Cretan archaeology. 
Botsford, G. W., and Sthler, E. G. Hellenic Civilization (N. Y., 1915, Columbia 

University Press, $4.00). Lengthy extracts from the sources, with commentary 

and bibliographies. 
Davis, W. S. The Influence of Wealth in Imperial Rome (N. Y., 1910, out of print). 

An interesting treatment of an important theme. 
Fowler, W. W. Social Life at Rome in the Age of Cicero (N. Y., 1909, Macmillan, 

$3.00). 
Gayi.ey, C. M. The Classic Myths in English Literature and in Art (2d ed., 

Boston, 1911, Ginn, $1.92). 
E, C. B. The Life, of the Ancient Greeks (N. Y., 1902, Appleton, $2.00). Well 

illustrated. 
IIoiM'.KiN, Thomas. The Dynasty of Theodosius (\ T . Y., [889, out of print). Popular 

lectures summarizing the author's extensive studies. 
Hopkinson, (Miss) L. W. Greek Lenders (Boston, 1918, Houghton Mifflin Co., 

$1.75). Simple biographies of eleven makers <>f Creek history. 



xxviii Suggestions for Further Study 

Mahaffy, J. P. What have the Greeks done for Modern Civilization? (N. Y., 1909, 
Putnam, $2.50). 

*Mau, August. Pompeii: Its Life and Art, translated by F. W. Kelsey (N. Y., 
1899, out of print). 

Oman, Charles. Seven Roman Statesmen of the Later Republic (N. Y., 1902, Long- 
mans, Green & Co., $2.25). A biographical presentation of Roman history. 

Pellison, Maurice. Roman Life in Pliny's Time, translated by Maud Wilkinson 
(Philadelphia, 1897, out of print). 

Powers, H. H. The Message of Greek Art (N. Y., 1913, out of print). 

Robinson, C. E. The Days of Alkibiades (N. Y., 1916, Longmans, Green & Co., 
$2.00). A picture of Greek life and culture in the Age of Pericles. 

*Stobart, J. C. The Glory that was Greece: A Survey of Hellenic Culture and Civili- 
zation (Philadelphia, 191 1, out of print). 

* The Grandeur that was Rome. A Survey of Roman Culture and Civilization 

(Philadelphia, 191 2, out of print). 

Tarbell, F. G. A History of Greek Art (2d ed., N. Y., 1905, Macmillan, $1.60). 

Tucker, T. G. Life in Ancient Athens (N. Y., 1906, Macmillan, $2.40). The 
most attractive treatment of the subject. 

Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul (N. Y., 1910, Macmillan, 

$3 -So). 

Zimmern, A. E. The Greek Commonwealth (N. Y., 191 1, Oxford University Press, 
American Branch, $3.80). 

MIDDLE AGES 

Adams, G.B. Civilization during the Middle A ges (2ded., N .Y ., 1914, Scribner, $2.75). 
Bateson, Mary. Medieval England (N. Y., 1903, Putnam, $2.50). Deals with 

economic and social life ; Story of the Nations. 
*Bryce, James. The Holy Roman Empire (new ed., N. Y., 1921, Macmillan, $3.75). 

A famous work, originally published in 1864. 
Cutts, E. L. Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages (London, 1872, DeLaMore 

Press, 7s. 6d.). An almost indispensable book. 
Davis, H. W. C. Medieval Europe (N. Y., 191 1, Holt, 90 cents). Home Univer- 
sity Library. 
Emerton, Ephraim. An Introduction to the Study of the Middle Ages (Boston, 1888, 

Ginn, $1.92). Of special value to beginners. 
Foord, Edward. The Byzantine Empire (N. Y., 191 1, out of print). The most 

convenient short treatise ; lavishly illustrated. 
Guerber, H. A. Legends of the Middle Ages (N. Y., 1896, American Book Co., 

$2.00). 
Haskins, C. H. The Normans in European History (Boston, 1915, Houghton 

Mifflin Co., $3.00). 
Lawrence, W. W. Medieval Story (N. Y., 191 1, Columbia University Press, $2.00). 

Discusses the great literary productions of the Middle Ages. 
*Luchaire, Achille. Social France at the Time of Philip Augustus, translated by 

E. B. Krehbiel (London, 1912, Murray, 10s. 6d.). A historical masterpiece. 
*Munro, D. C, and Sellery, G. C. Medieval Civilization (2d ed., N. Y., 1907, 

Century Co., $2.50). Translated selections from standard works by French 

and German scholars. 



Suggestions for Further Study xxix 

Tapean, Eva M. When Knights were Bold (Boston, ion, Houghton Mifflin Co., 
$300). An economic and social study of the Feudal Age; charmingly written 
tot young people. 

*THOSNDlKE, Lynn. The History of Medieval Europe (Boston, 1Q17, Houghton 
Mifflin Co., S3. 60). An admirable college text-book. 

TRANSITION TO MODERN TIMES 

BOURNE, E. G. Spain in America, 1450-15S0 (N. Y., 1904, Harper, $2.00). Ameri- 
can Nation Series. 

Cheyntey, E. P. European Background of American History, 1 300-1600 (N. Y., 
1004, Harper, S2.00). American Nation Series. 

Hudson, W. H. The Story of the Renaissance (N. Y., 191 2, Cassell, $1.50). A well- 
written volume. 

*Htjlmr, E. M. The Renaissance, the Protestant Revolution, and the Catholic 
Reformation in Continental Europe (rev. ed., N. Y., 1915, Century Co., $3.50). 
The best work on the subject by an American scholar. 

Seebohm, Frederic. The Era of the Protestant Revolution (N. Y., 1875, Scribner, 
$1.75). Epochs of Modern History. 

Smith, Preserved. Life and Letters of Martin Luther (Boston, 1910, Houghton 
Mifflin Co., $3.50). Written from a Protestant standpoint. 

THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES 
Eggleston, Edward. The Transit of Civilization from England to America in the 

Seventeenth Century (N. Y., 1902, Appleton, $3.50). 
Firth, C. H. Oliver Cromwell and the Rule of tlie Puritans in England (N. Y., 1900, 

Putnam, S2.50). Heroes of the Nations. 
Hassall, Arthur. The Balance of Power, 1715-1780 (N. Y., 1896, Macmilhn, 

$2.50). Periods of European History. 
Louis XIV and the Zenith of the French Monarchy (N. Y., 1895, Putnam, 

S2. 30). Heroes of the Nations. 
Lowell, E. J. The Eve of the French Revolution (2d ed., Boston, 1S93, Houghton 

Mifflin Co., S3. 00). A satisfactory account of the Old Regime in France. 
Reddaway, W. F. Frederick the Great and the Rise of Prussia (N. Y., 1904, Putnam, 

$2.50). Heroes of the Nations. 
Tuwaites, R. G. France in America (N. Y., 1905, Harper, $2.00). American 

Nation Series. 
Tyler, L. G. England in America (N. Y., 1904, Harper, $2.00). American Nation 

Series. 
Wakeman, H. O. The Ascendancy of France, 1508-1715 (4th ed., N. Y., 1914, 

Macmillan, $2.75). 

THE REVOLUTIONARY AND NAPOLEONIC ERA 
*Bournte, II. E. The Revolutionary Period in Europe, 1763-1815 (N. Y., 1914, 

Century Co., $3.50). Century Historical Series. 
Carlyle, Thomas. The French Revolution (N. Y., 1837, Dutton, 2 vols., each $1.00). 

Not a history, but a literary masterpiece. 
Fisher, Herbert. Napoleon (N. Y., 1913, Holt, 90 cents). Home University 

Library. 



xxx Suggestions for Further Study 

*Henderson, E. F. Symbol and Satire in the French Revolution (N. Y., iqi2, 

Putnam, $4.00). Contains 171 illustrations from contemporary prints. 
Madelin, Louis. The French Revolution (N. Y., 1916, Putnam, $3.50). A popular 

work translated from the French. 
Mathews, Shailer. The French Revolution (N. Y., 1900, Longmans, Green & 

Co., $1.35). Ends with the year 1795. 
Rose, J. H. The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era, 1789-18 15 (2d ed., N. Y., 1895, 

Putnam, $1.50). The work of a very competent British scholar ; Cambridge 

Historical Series. 
♦Stephens, H. M. Revolutionary Europe, 1789-1815 (N. Y., 1893, Macmillan, 

$2.50). Periods of European History. 

THE NINETEENTH AND TWENTIETH CENTURIES 
*Andrews, C. M. The Historical Development of Modern Europe (N. Y., 1896- 

1898, Putnam, two volumes in one, $4.50). Covers the period 1815-1897. 
Bassett, J. S. Our War with Germany (N. Y., 1920, Knopf, $4.00). A scholarly 

history. 
Davis, W. S., Anderson, William, and Tyler, M. W. The Roots of the War 

(N. Y., 191 8, Century Co., $2.50). A non-technical, yet scholarly, history of 

Europe, 1870-1914. 
Gibbins, H. de B. Economic and Industrial Progress of the Century (Edinburgh, 

1903, Chambers, 55.). 
Gibbons, H. A. The New Map of Europe, IQ11-IQ14 (4th ed., N. Y., 1915, Century 

Co., $3.00). 

The New Map of Asia, iQoo-1919 (N. Y., 1919, Century Co., $3.00). 

The New Map of Africa (N. Y., 1918, Century Co., $3.00). 

Gooch, G. P. History of Our Time, 1885-1911 (N. Y., 191 1, Holt, 90 cents). 

Home University Library. 
Harris, N. D. Intervention and Colonization in Africa (Boston, 1914, Houghton 

Mifflin Co., $2.75). 
Hayes, C. J. H. A Brief History of the Great War (N. Y., 1920, Macmillan, 

$3-So). 
Hazen, C. D. Modern European History (N. Y., 1917, Holt, $2.40). Chiefly a 

political narrative ; American Historical Series. 
Hearnshaw, F. J. C. Main Currents of European History, 1815-1915 (N. Y., 1917, 

Macmillan, $2.60). Illuminating comment; not a continuous historical narra- 
tive. 
Hornbeck, S. K. Contemporary Politics in the Far East (N. Y., 1916, Appleton, 

$3.So). 
Johnston, (Sir) H. H. The Opening-Up of Africa (N. Y., 191 1, Holt, 90 cents). 

Home University Library. 
McCarthy, Justin. The Story of tjie People of England in the Nineteenth Century 

(N. Y., 1899, Putnam, 2 vols., $5.00). Story of the Nations. 
Marvin, F. S. The Century of Hope (N. Y., 1919, Oxford University Press, $3.00). 

A sketch of intellectual and social history between 1815 and 1914. 
Moore, E. C. West and East (N. Y., 1920, Scribner, $4.00). An account of the 

expansion of European countries in Africa and Asia, with particular reference 

to foreign missions. 



Suggestions for Further Study xxxi 

Oakes, (Sir) Ai gtjstus, and Mowat, 1'.. r>. The Great European Treaties of the 
• nth Century (N. V., 1018, Oxford University 1'rcss, American Branch, 

$3-75). A very useful volume containing both historical summaries and the 

texts of treaties. 
!•'. A. The Governments of Europe (rev. ed., N. V., 1Q20, Macmillan, $4-25). 

* Economic Development of Modem Europe (N. Y., 1917, Macmillan, S.v.so). 

PHILLIPS, W. A. Modem Europe, 1815-1SQQ (5th ed., N. Y., igis, Macmillan, 

$2.50). Periods of European History. 
*Rosh, J. H. The Development of the European Nations, 1S70-1Q14 (5th ed., N. Y., 

1916, Putnam, two vols, in one, $3.50). 
Schumro, J. S. Modem and Contemporary European History (Boston, 1018, 

Houghton Mifflin Co., Sj.go). An admirable college text-book covering the 

period from the French Revolution to the present time. 
Shepherd, W. R. Latin America (N. Y., 1914, Holt, 90 cents). Home University 

Library. 
Turner, E. R. Europe, 178Q-IQ20 (N. Y., 1921, Doubleday, Page & Co., $3.50). 

An interesting and scholarly volume, with many maps. 
Weir, Archibald. An Introduction to the History oj Modem Europe (Boston, 1907, 

out of print). A suggestive book for teachers. 
Mr. Punch's Ilisttry of the Great War (N. Y., 1919, Cassell, $3.50). Contains many 

cartoons reproduced from the English journal Punch. 



WORLD HISTORY 

CHAPTER I 
PREHISTORIC TIMES 

1. Introductory 

History is a narrative of what civilized men have thought 
or done in past times — whether a day, a year, a century, or a 
millennium ago. Since men do not live in isolation, Definition of 
but everywhere in association, history is necessarily history 
concerned with social groups and especially with states and 
nations. Just as biography describes the life of individuals, so 
history relates the rise, progress, and decline of human societies. 

History does not limit its attention to a fraction of the com- 
munity to the exclusion of the rest. It does not deal solely 
with rulers and warriors, with forms of government, scope of 
public affairs, and domestic or foreign wars. More history 
and more, history becomes an account of the entire culture of 
a people. The historian wants to learn about their houses, 
furniture, costumes, and food ; what occupations they followed ; 
what schools they supported ; what beliefs and superstitions 
they held ; what amusements and festivals they enjoyed. 
Human progress in invention, science, art, music, literature, 
morals, religion, and other aspects of civilization is what 
chiefly interests the historical student of to-day. 

Civilization is a recent thing, almost a thing of yesterday. 

It began not more than five or six thousand years ago in the 

river valleys of Egypt and western Asia. The „ 

t, • , t, i i • , i • • Civilization 

Egyptians and Babylonians by this time were 

cultivating the soil, laying out roads and canals, working 

mines, building cities, organizing stable governments, and 

keeping written records. All the rest of the world was then 

i 



2 Prehistoric Times 

inhabited by savage and barbarous peoples, such as are still 
found in every continent. 

The savage is a mere child of nature. He secures food from 
wild plants and animals ; he knows nothing of metals, but 
Savagery makes his tools and weapons of wood, bone, and 

and bar- stone ; he wears little or no clothing ; and his 

home is merely a cave, a rock shelter, or a rude 
bark hut. Such miserable folk occupy the interior of South 
America, Africa, Australia, New Guinea, the Philippines, 
and other regions. Barbarism forms a transitional stage be- 
tween savagery and civilization. The barbarian has gained 
some control of nature. He has learned to sow and reap the 
fruits of the earth, instead of depending entirely upon hunting 
and fishing for a food supply, to domesticate animals, and ordi- 
narily to use implements of metal. Barbarous tribes at the 
present time include certain North American Indians, the 
Pacific Islanders, and most of the African negroes. 

The facts collected by modern science make it certain that 
early man was first a savage and then a barbarian before he 
Human reached anywhere the stage of civilization. We 

progress know this, not on the evidence of written records 

— early man made neither inscriptions nor books — but from 
the things which he left behind him in many parts of the 
world, particularly in Europe and the Mediterranean region. 
These include a few of his own bones, many bones of animals 
killed by him, and a great variety of tools, weapons, and other 
objects. Systematic study of such remains began during the 
nineteenth century. The study is still in its infancy, but it has 
gone far enough to afford some idea of human progress before 
the rise of civilization. 

2. Man's Place in Nature 
Astronomy and geology present a wonderful picture of the earth 
in past ages. The astronomer tells us that space is for the most 
Origin of the P ai "t mere emptiness, that at vast intervals in this 
earth emptiness are the so-called "fixed stars," — flam- 

ing, incandescent masses of matter, — that the sun is such a star, 



Man's Place in Nature 3 

and that it threw off, one by one, the planets of the solar system. 
Our earth thus separated from the parent sun probably much 
more than a hundred million years ago. 

The geologist tells us that in process of time the cooling 
earth gradually raised over its molten interior a thin crust of 
fire-fused rocks. Then the steam in the atmos- Life on the 
phere began to condense and, falling upon this earth 
crust, formed the first rivers, lakes, and seas. The dust and 
rock particles in the water accumulated in layers, or strata, 
which hardened into the stratified rocks. They reach to a 
depth of perhaps twenty-five miles below the surface and contain 
fossil remains of plants and animals. The fossils show that life 
began in lowly forms on the earth, and that all existing life 
has evolved from these earlier, lowlier forms. 

Most of geological time since the origin of the earth is divided 
into three great epochs. The first or Primary epoch saw the 
appearance of plants, such as seaweeds, mosses, Geological 
ferns, and finally of huge-stemmed trees, whose time 
abundant vegetation formed our coal measures. It saw also 
the appearance of animals, beginning with simple invertebrate 
creatures which lived in the water and passing to fishes and 
amphibians. The Secondary epoch was especially the age of 
enormous reptiles, whose skeletons are shown in museums. 
During this time bird-like animals developed and became true 
birds as they grew wings and modified their reptilian scales into 
feathers. In the third or Tertiary epoch there appeared for 
the first time a variety and abundance of mammals. Such is 
the record of the rocks for untold millions of years before the 
first traces of man. 

The Tertiary epoch was characterized by a semi-tropical 
climate, even in the Arctic region. Toward the close of 
the Tertiary profound climatic changes began to 
occur in northern latitudes, producing what is 
called the Ice Age. An immense ice cap formed in the lands 
encircling the North Pole and gradually moved southward. 
North America to the valleys of the Ohio and the Missouri 
and Europe to the Rhine and the Thames were covered by an 



Prehistoric Times 



icy mass, estimated to have exceeded a mile in thickness. 
Great glaciers also arose in the Alps, Pyrenees, and Caucasus 
and descended from these mountains far into the plains. The 
Ice Age, despite its name, was not one of uninterrupted cold. 
There seem to have been four advances and retreats of the ice, 
resulting in as many more or less warm intervals. The ac- 
companying map represents Europe in the second glacial stage, 







Former Sea Level 



Europe in the Ice Age 

Discovery sites of Paleolithic man: i, Piltdown; 2, Heidelberg; 3, Neanderthal; 4, Cro- 
Magnon; 5, Briinn; 6, Furfooz; 7, Ofnet. 

the period of the greatest extension of ice fields and glaciers. 
Guesses about the duration of the Ice Age vary considerably ; 
one estimate makes it begin about 500,000 years ago. Our own 
postglacial stage may have begun about 25,000 years ago. 

The geography of Europe in the Ice Age was unlike what it 
is to-day. Considerable areas now submerged beneath the 
Europe in Atlantic Ocean were, then dry land. Great 
the Ice Age Britain and Ireland formed part of the Continent, 
and no North Sea separated them from Scandinavia. The 



A Tun's Place in Nature 



Mediterranean basin contained two inland seas. Europe was 
united to both Africa and Asia, where are now the strait of 
Gibraltar, the island of Sicily, and the Dardanelles. The land 
bridges thus formed afforded an easy entrance into Europe 
for the great African and Asiatic mammals, and perhaps for 
earliest man. 

ANTIQUITY OF MAN 



Geological 
Periods 


Climatic 
Stages 


Animal 
Life 


Human 
Types 


Cultural 
Epochs 


Ttme 

Estimates 




' 


Modern 
Animals 


Modern 
Races 


Later Iron Age 


Europe, 500 B.C. 




Early Iron Age 


Europe, 

1000-500 B.C. 
Orient, 

1800-1000 B.C. 


Recent 


Copper-Bronze 
Age 


Europe, 

3000-1000 B.C. 
Orient, 

4OOO-ISOO B.C. 




Neolithic or 
New Stone Age 


Europe, 7000 n.c. 




Postglacial 


Reindeer 
Musk Sheep 
Elk 

Steppe Horse 
Wild Ox 

(Aurochs) 
European Bison 
Cave Bear 
Woolly 

Rhinoceros 
Woolly 

Mammoth 
Hippopotamus 
Elephant 
Rhinoceros 
Saber-tooth 

Tiger 
Wild Boar 
Lynx 
Lion 
Hyxna 


Cro-Magnon 


Later Palxo- 

lithic or 
Old Stone Age 


25,000 B.C. 




IV. Glacial 


Neanderthal 


Early 

Paleolithic 
or 
Old Stone 

Age 


50,000 B.C. 




3. Interglacial 


Piltdown 


150,000 B.C. 




III. Glacial 




Eolithic Age 


175,000 B.C. 


Ice Age 


2. Interglacial 


Heidelberg 


375,000 B.C. 




II. Glacial 




400,000 B.C. 




1. Interglacial 




475,000 B.C. 




I. Glacial 




500,000 B.C. 



The first traces of man in Europe are associated with the 
Ice Age. In 1907 a human lower jaw was found in a sand pit 
near Heidelberg, Germany. It lay about eighty Heidelberg 
feet below the surface, in company with the man 
remains of various animals, including an elephant and a rhinoc- 



Prehistoric Times 




The Heidelberg Lower Jaw 

About one-half life size. ■ 



eros. The jaw presents several remarkable features. It is 

the largest human jaw known ; it entirely lacks a chin ; and its 

narrowness behind 

probably did not give 

the tongue sufficient 

' play for articulate 

speech. Heidelberg 

man, as we may call 

him, must have been 

a strange-looking 

creature. He has 

been assigned to the 

second interglacial 

stage. 

Another important discovery was made in 1911-1912. A 

gravel bed at Piltdown, in the English county of Sussex, yielded 

„ human remains, consisting of part of a skull, a lower 

Piltdown man . , ' , , ■ 1 • r , 

jaw, and several teeth, together with remains of the 

hippopotamus, rhinoceros, and other animals. This "find" has 
excited immense interest, because Piltdown man is the most 
ancient human type in which the form of the head and the size 
of the brain are approximately known. The skull is of extraor- 
dinary thickness, far greater than that of any modern men. 
Judging from its shape and size, it held a comparatively small 
brain. The jaw is even less human, especially in the absence 
of a chin. The teeth likewise exhibit non-human character- 
istics. We cannot be sure, however, that skull and jaw be- 
longed to the same individual. Piltdown man is thought to 
have lived during the third interglacial stage. 

The next important discovery of human fossils was made 
as far back as 1856, but its significance was not at first recog- 
Neanderthal nized. In that year some workmen, clearing a 
man small cave in the valley known as the Neander- 

thal, Rhenish Prussia, came upon a human skeleton. The 
cranium and various bones of the body were secured for pur- 
poses of study. The most striking features of the skull are its 
thickness, the low, retreating forehead, and the prominent eye- 




Man's Place in Nature 7 

brow ridges. As long as this skull remained the only one of its 

kind, scientists could argue that it belonged to an idiot or to 

a diseased person. But during the last half century nearly 

thirty other examples have been found, thus proving the 

former existence of Neanderthal man in western Europe. In 

appearance, he was short (about 5 

feet, 3 inches) , thickset, heavy-browed, 

heavy- jawed, and with a receding 

chin. His body was probably hairy. 

His thumb seems to have been less 

flexible than that of modern men. 

His head, looked at from above, was 

very narrow, and he could not walk 

absolutely erect. Neanderthal man 

lived during the fourth glacial stage, SpY Skull 

1 ..i ,i 1 v One of two skulls of the Neander- 

along with the cave bear, rave lion, thal type They werc discovcred 
cave hvama, and other animals now in iSS6, in the cave of Spy, near 

extinct Namur, Belgium. 

Thousands of years passed before there appeared in Europe 
another human type, called Cro-Magnon, from the name of a 
French cave where five skeletons were unearthed Cro-Magnon 
in 1868. Cro-Magnon man, as we know from man 
these and other examples, was tall, with a broad face, a prom- 
inent nose, slightly developed eyebrow ridges, well-developed 
chin, and a large brain. His physical and mental development 
places him close to modern man, though he lived during early 
postglacial times, when the woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, 
bison, reindeer, and wild steppe horse still ranged throughout 
western Europe. 

Western Europe, the scene of so much of later history, is 
thus unique in providing us with the physical evidence for 
human evolution. Though the evidence is in- Human 
complete, we already know that during a period evolution 
probably several hundred thousand years long, man was slowly 
working upward from an almost brute-like state. Something 
about the cultural development of Heidelberg, Piltdown, Nean- 
derthal, and Cro-Magnon men is also known. 



8 



Prehistoric Times 



3. The Old Stone Age 

It takes an effort to visualize the condition of the earliest 
men. They were naked, tireless, houseless, without tools and 
Cultural weapons, without even articulate speech, and with 

development nothing but their human hands and brains to 
secure food and protect themselves from the wild animals on 
every side. There are no living savages so low as this, for all 
use tools, make fire, construct shelters against rain and wind, 
speak elaborate languages, and possess other elements of culture. 






I 2 3 

Prehistoric Stone Implements 

i, Eolith; 2, Palaeolithic fist hatchet; 3, Neolithic ax head. 

The earliest men started without any culture. They had to 
acquire it by their own unaided efforts. 

Man's first tools and weapons were those that lay ready to 
his hand. A branch from a tree served as a spear; a thick 
stick in his strong arms became a club ; while 
stones picked up at haphazard were thrown as 
missiles or used as pounders to crack nuts and crush big marrow 
bones. Eventually, man discovered that a shaped implement 
was far more serviceable than an unshaped one, and so he 
began chipping flints into rude hatchets, knives, spearheads, 
borers, and the like. Such objects are called palseoliths (old- 
stones), and the period when they were produced is therefore 



Implements 



The Old Stone Age 9 

known as the Palaeolithic, or Old Stone Age. 1 It seems to 
have begun in the third interglacial stage and probably lasted 
more than a hundred thousand years. 

No slight skill is required to chip a flint along one face or 
both faces, until it takes a symmetrical form. But practice 
makes perfect, and the Palaeolithic Age for the improvement 
most part shows steady progress in manufactur- of implements 
ing, not only stone implements, but also those of bone, mammoth 
ivory, and reindeer horn. Many different kinds of imple- 
ments, adapted to special uses, were gradually produced. In 
addition to those just mentioned, we find awls, wedges, saws, 
drills, chisels, barbed harpoons, and even so neat a device as 
a spear-thrower. Bone and wooden handles were also devised, 
thus adding immensely to the effectiveness of tools and weapons. 

Palaeolithic man learned fire-making. Just how, we cannot 

say. Probably he struck a piece of iron pyrites with a flint 

and then allowed the sparks to fall into a bed of dry 

i o -n 1 1 • t 1 Fire-making 

leaves or moss. Some savages still do this, though 

more often they produce fire by rubbing two pieces of wood 

together. The discovery of fire made it possible for man to 

cook food, instead of eating it raw, to smoke meats and thus 

preserve them indefinitely, to protect himself at night against 

animal enemies, and to make his cave home comfortable. Later, 

the use of fire enabled him to bake clay into pottery and to smelt 

the metals, but these great steps in progress were not taken in 

Palaeolithic times. 

The men of the Old Stone Age doubtless passed much of 

their time in the open, following the game from place to place, 

and, when night came on, camping out under the 

n™ 1 .1 , 1 r. , , . . Habitations 

stars. They built huts, also. Some of their pic- 
tures represent rude structures with a central pole and occa- 

1 Some authorities hold that an Eolithic (Dawn Stone) Age preceded the Palae- 
olithic. Eoliths are small, rough stones, one part shaped as if to be held in the 
hand and the other part edged or pointed as for cutting. Some may be natural 
productions, but others seem to be of human workmanship. Eoliths have been 
found as far back as the beginning of the Ice Age and even earlier in the Tertiary 
eDoch. If man really did make them, they must be regarded as the earliest evidences 
of his life on the earth. 



IO 



Prehistoric Times 



sionally with props on either side. More commonly they took 
shelter under rock ledges and in caves, as some savages do 
to-day. Limestone caverns, often very deep and roomy, are 
especially numerous in western Europe, where they seem to 
have been occupied by successive generations for many cen- 
turies. Huge accumulations of ashes and charcoal, stone 
implements, bones of animals, and sometimes those of man 
himself cover the floor of a Palaeolithic cave to a depth of many 
feet. These objects are often found sealed up tight in stalag- 
mite deposits formed by lime-burdened water dropping from 




A Mammoth 

An engraving on a piece of ivory tusk. Found in the rock shelter of La Madeleine, France. 
Represents a woolly mammoth charging. Comparison with the remains of mammoths com- 
pletely preserved in the ice of Siberia shows that the Palaeolithic artist accurately delineated 
the animal's protuberant forehead, hairy covering, and huge, curved tusks. 

the roof. What was man's home has thus become a museum, 
only awaiting investigation by a trained student to reveal its 
story of the past. 

Palaeolithic man at the outset must have lived on what 
nature supplied in the way of wild berries, nuts, roots, herbs, 
honey, the eggs of wild fowl, shellfish, and grubs, 
suppy ^^ ^^ ^ e sma n animals which he could kill by 
throwing stones and sticks. As his implements improved and 
his skill increased, he became a fisher, trapper, and hunter of 
big game. He killed and ate the woolly mammoth, hippo- 
potamus, European bison, reindeer, and especially the steppe 
horse, which at one time roamed in great herds over western 
Europe. There is a Palaeolithic station in France estimated 



The Old Stone Age 



ii 



Art 



to contain the bones of one hundred thousand horses. The 
pelts of the slain animals were made into covers and clothing, 
as we know from the discovery of flint skin scrapers and bone 
needles. 

Some of these cave dwellers were talented artists. They 
decorated stone and bone implements with engravings, modeled 
figures in clay, made stone and ivory statuettes, 
and covered the walls of their cavern homes with 
a variety of paintings in red, yellow, brown, and other vivid 
colors. The subjects are generally animals, though a few 
representations of the 
human form have also 
been found. The best 
Palaeolithic pictures 
are remarkably life- 
like, far surpassing 
the efforts of modern 
savages. The men 
who made them were 
evidently close ob- 
servers of animal life. 

The cave dwellers 
apparently had a rude 
form of 
religion. 
Bodies buried in caves 

were sometimes surrounded by offerings of food, implements, 
and ornaments, which must have been intended for the use 
of the deceased. Such funeral rites point to a belief in the soul 
and in its survival after death. 

There are other aspects of Palaeolithic culture about which 
little or nothing can be learned with certainty. We can only 

surmise, from what is known of present-dav 

• i i i 'i Social life 

savages, that even at this remote period people had 

begun to cooperate in hunting and for defense against animal 

and human foes. Each group must have been small — a few 

hundred individuals at the most — for population was scanty. 





Religion 



Head of a Girl 

Musee St.-Germain, Paris 
A small head of a young girl carved from mammoth 
ivory. Found at Brassempouy, France, in cave deposits 
belonging to the Old Stone Age. The hair is arranged 
somewhat after the early Egyptian fashion. Of the fea- 
tures the mouth alone is wanting. 



12 



Prehistoric Times 



Government doubtless existed, but whether by chiefs or by 
the elders of the little community we cannot say. Probably the 
family had also appeared, and men and women were beginning 
to live together more or less permanently under some form of 
marriage. The social life of man is 
very ancient, as well as his religion, 
art, and material culture. 

4. The New Stone Age 

The Neolithic or New Stone Age, 
when men began to grind and polish 
Europe in some of their stone imple- 




Neoiithic ments after chipping them, 

dawned in Europe proba- 
bly less than ten thousand years ago. 
The map of Europe in this period 
presented nearly the same outlines as 
to-day. Great Britain and Ireland 
were now separated from the Conti- 
nent by the shallow waters of the North 
Sea, English Channel, and Irish Sea. 
Owing to the sinking of the Mediter- 
ranean area, Spain and Italy were no 
longer joined to North Africa by land 
bridges. The plants which flourished 
in colder Palaeolithic times gave place 
to those characteristic of a temperate 
climate, and vast forests began to cover 
what had formerly been treeless steppes. 
The woolly rhinoceros, woolly mammoth, and cave bear became 
extinct ; the musk sheep and reindeer retreated to Arctic lati- 
tudes, while the hippopotamus, elephant, and other big mammals 
found their way to tropical zones. The animals associated with 
Neolithic men represented species familiar to us, except for some 
survivals, such as the elk, wild boar, and European bison. 

We do not yet know what became of Palaeolithic men. They 
may have become extinct ; they may have followed the retreat- 



Egyptian Neolithic 

Knives 

Brussels Museum 

Discovered in prehistoric tombs 

in the Nile Valley. Made of 

flint, ripple-flaked on one side 

and ground on the other. The 

flakes were struck off with such 

precision that the ripples or ribs 

left on the edge and back are 

symmetrically arranged. No 

finer work was ever produced 

by Stone Age craftsmen. 



The New Stone Age 



i3 



ing ice short and the retreating reindeer toward the northeast 
into Siberia and Arctic America ; or they may have remained 
in their old locations and intermingled with the Neolithic 
invading Neolithic peoples. These newcomers ap- peoples 
parently came from western Asia and northern Africa, and 
gradually spread over all Europe. The Neolithic peoples 
belonged to the White Race. Their blood flows in the veins 
of modern Europeans, who are chiefly 
their descendants. 

Our knowledge of the Neolithic Age 
comes, not from deep-lying or sealed-up 
deposits, such as those Neolithic 
in Palaeolithic caves, but remains 
from remains found on or near the 
surface of the soil or in rubbish heaps 
and burial places. Along the Baltic 
coast stretch huge mounds of bones 
and shells, marking the sites of former 
camping places. These " kitchen mid- 
dens," to give them their Danish name, 
are sometimes a thousand feet long, two 
to three hundred feet wide, and ten feet 
high. Implements of stone, bone, and 
wood, together with pieces of pottery 
and other things of human workman- 
ship, are found in the " kitchen middens." Switzerland affords 
numerous remains of lake dwellers, who, for protection against 
their enemies, lived over the water in huts resting on sharpened 
piles driven into the bottom of the lake. The huts have disap- 
peared, but the mud about the piles contains thousands of ob- 
jects, including animal bones, seeds of various plants and fruits, 
implements, shreds of coarse cloth, fragments of pottery, 
household utensils, and bits of furniture. Neolithic men also 
erected many stone monuments, either single pillars (menhirs) 
or groups of pillars (dolmens). The former often marked a 
grave ; the latter usually served as sepulchers for the dead. 
They are rude memorials of far-off times and vanished peoples. 




Carved Menhir 

From Saint Sernin in Aveyron, a 
department of southern France. 



14 



Prehistoric Times 



The Neolithic Age covered only a brief space of time, as 
compared with its predecessor, but it was an age of rapid prog- 
Neolithic ress - Neolithic implements, though still of stone, 
culture bone, and wood, were often of exceeding beauty 
and finish, particularly arrowheads (testifying to the invention 
of the bow), and stone axes with a sharp cutting edge. The 
men of the " kitchen middens " began to make pottery, chiefly 
for cooking vessels, and they domesticated the dog. The lake 
dwellers possessed goats, sheep, and swine, as well as dogs, 




A Dolmen 

A Neolithic monument in Ireland. The covering stone measures about 75 feet in length and 
15 feet in breadth. Its thickness varies from 3 to 5 feet. 

plaited baskets, spun and wove textiles, prepared leather, built 
boats, used wheeled carts, and, most important of all, cultivated 
some of the cereals, including wheat, barley, and millet. The 
new sources of food thus opened up enabled Neolithic peoples 
to abandon the migratory life of hunters and to settle in per- 
manent villages. Their community life must have been well 
organized, for the erection of lake dwellings and stone monu- 
ments required the cooperation of many individuals. In 
short, Neolithic peoples were not savages; they had passed 
from savagery to barbarism. 

Neolithic culture was not confined to Europe. It also 
Transition to ex i ste d i n western Asia, in Egypt, in North Africa, 
the use of and on the islands of Cyprus and Crete. The en- 
metals t - re k asm Q f ^g Mediterranean formed a Neolithic 
center. Here the transition to the use of metals first occurred. 



The Age of Metals 15 

5. The Age of Metals 

Civilization rests on the metals. Stone is not pliable ; it 

is very apt to split in use ; it cannot be ground to a sharp edge. 

No wonder that in time men began to seek sub- 

, r , -iii The metals 

stitutes in the soiter and more easily worked 

metals — gold, silver, tin, and copper. These are often found 
in a pure state and not as ores, so that they can be readily ex- 
tracted and worked cold. The American Indians in this way 
got pure copper from mines near Lake Superior and made 
metal spearheads, knives, and hatchets, which were modeled 
on stone implements. Other barbarous peoples have done the 
same thing. In fact, hammering the metals generally pre- 
ceded smelting them. 

Credit for the invention of metallurgy belongs to the Egyp- 
tians. Some of the most ancient graves in Egypt, dating from 
about 4000 B.C., contain needles and chisels made 
by smelting the crude copper ore found in the Nile 
Valley. At a very early period the Egyptians began to work 
the copper mines on the peninsula of Sinai. The Babylonians 
probably obtained copper from the same region. Another 
source of copper was the island of Cyprus, which is rich in that 
metal. The very name of the island means " copper " (Greek 
Kiipros). Copper implements gradually spread into Europe, 
and with their use the Neolithic Age gave way to the Age of 
Metals. 

But copper implements were soft and would not keep an 
edge. Some ancient smith, more ingenious than his fellows, 
discovered that the addition of a small quantity of 
tin to the copper produced the much harder and 
tougher alloy called bronze. Where this simple but most 
important discovery took place, we cannot say. Bronze made 
its appearance in Egypt at least as early as 3000 B.C. and some- 
what later in Cyprus, Crete, Asia Minor, and the coasts of 
Greece. Traders subsequently carried the new metal through- 
out the length and breadth of Europe. 

The great durability and hardness of iron must have been 



i6 



Prehistoric Times 



Iron 



soon noticed by metallurgists, but, as compared with copper 
and tin, it was difficult both to mine and to smelt. Hence the 
introduction of iron occurred at quite a late period, 
and in some countries after the dawn of history. 
The Egyptians seem to have made little use of iron before 1500 
B.C. They called it the " metal of heaven," as if they obtained 
it from meteorites. In the first five books of the Bible iron is 
mentioned only thirteen times, though copper and bronze 
are referred to forty-four times. In the Homeric poems of 
the ancient Greeks we find iron considered so valuable that a 






Prehistoric Iron Implements 

From La Tene, Switzerland 
1, Spearpoint; 2, shears; 3, safety pin. 



lump of it is one of the chief prizes at athletic games. Western 
and northern Europe became acquainted with iron only in 
the last thousand years before Christ. 

The superior qualities of iron have secured for it preeminence 
among the metals. Nevertheless, peoples without any knowl- 
Diffusion of edge of iron are still met with in remote parts of 
iron the world. The Australian tribes, for instance, 

continue to make stone implements as rude as those of Palae- 
olithic man in Europe. The South Sea Islands, owing to their 
peculiar formation, produce no metals. Their inhabitants, when 
discovered a few centuries ago, were still in the Stone Age, and 
so ignorant of metal that they planted the first iron nails obtained 



Races of Man 17 

from Europeans, in the hope of raising a new crop. Among the 
Malays and the African negroes the knowledge and use of iron 
also followed immediately upon the Stone Age. The American 
Indians, before the discovery of the New World, knew nothing 
of iron. Most of them used stone implements like those of 
Neolithic Europe, together with unsmelted copper, gold, and 
silver. In Mexico and Peru, however, smelted copper and 
bronze were also known. India, Indo-China, and China afford 
evidence of the regular succession in those regions of copper, 
bronze, and iron. 

6. Races of Man 

The different races arose in prehistoric times as man gradually 
spread throughout the habitable earth. Racial distinctions 
are based on physical characteristics, especially skin Racial dis- 
color, head form, and texture of the hair. Thus, tinctions 
the black-skinned peoples have long, narrow heads and crisp, 
woolly hair. The yellow-skinned peoples, on the contrary, have 
short, broad heads and straight, lank hair. Less important 
racial distinctions are found in the shape of the nose as thin and 
prominent or large and flat, in the orbit of the eyes as horizontal 
or oblique (compare the " almond " eyes of Orientals), and in 
the extent to which the upper and lower jaws project beyond 
the line of the face. All these physical characteristics reflect 
the influence of climate and natural surroundings on early man 
in various parts of the world. They seem to have changed little 
or not at all during historic times. Five or six thousand years 
ago they were as marked as now, judging from pictures on old 
Egyptian monuments and from the examination of ancient 
skulls. 

Three primary varieties of man are distinguished : The Black 
(Negroid) Race, the Yellow (Mongoloid) Race, and the White 
(Caucasian) Race. This classification is not alto- classification 
gether satisfactory. The Australians, among whom of races 
Negroid traits preponderate, nevertheless resemble Caucasians 
in some respects, and the Mongoloid Polynesians possess both 
Caucasian and Negroid resemblances ; while important physical 



i8 



Prehistoric Times 



CLASSIFICATION OF MANKIND 



Races 


Peoples 


Languages 


Black or 
Necroid 


i. Negroes proper 

2. Bantu Negroes 

3. Dwarf Negroes or Pygmies 

4. Hottentots and Bushmen 

5. Dravidians (India) and Veddas 

(Ceylon) 

6. Papuans (in New Guinea and the 

Melanesian Islands) 

7. Australians 




Yellow or 
Mongoloid 


1. Mongolians proper (Chinese, Jap- 

anese, Koreans, Burmans, 
Siamese, Manchus, Mongols, 
Tatars, Tibetans, Siberian 
tribes, Turks, Bulgarians, Mag- 
yars or Hungarians, Esthoni- 
ans, Finns, Lapps) 

2. Malays (in Formosa, the Philip- 

pines, Malay Archipelago, Nic- 
obar Islands, Madagascar) 

3. Polynesians (Maori of New Zea- 

land, Tongans, Samoans, Ha- 
waiians, etc.) 

4. American Indians 




White or 
Caucasian 




1. Hamitic (Libyans, Egyptians, East- 

ern Hamites) 

2. Semitic (Babylonians, Assyrians, 

Phoenicians, Hebrews, Aramae- 
ans, Arabs, Abyssinians) 

3. Indo-European 

a. Asiatic (Hindus, Medes, Persians. 

Hittites, Armenians, Scythians) 

b. Grasco-Latin (Albanians, Greeks, 

Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, 
French, Walloons, Rumanians) 

c. Celtic (Bretons, Welsh, Irish, 

Highland Scots) 

d. Teutonic (Germans, Frisians, 

Dutch, Flemings, Danes, Nor- 
wegians, Swedes, English, Low- 
land Scots) 

e. Lettic (Letts, Lithuanians) 
/. Slavic 

South Slavs (Serbians, Monte- 
negrins, Croatians, Slove- 
nians) 
West Slavs (Czechs, Slovaks, 
Poles) 

East Slavs (Great Russians, 
Little Russians or Ruthe- 
nians, White Russians) 



differences separate both Malays and American Indians from 
other members of the Yellow Race. Again, various peoples of 
Asiatic origin — Ottoman Turks, Bulgarians, Magyars or 
Hungarians, Esthonians, Finns, and Lapps — have so blended 
with Caucasian peoples in Europe as to lose almost entirely 



Races of Man 



19 




20 



Prehistoric Times 



their Mongoloid characteristics. No race, indeed, is pure. 
Repeated migrations, raids, and conquests brought about racial 
intermixture almost everywhere. 

At the dawn of history each of the three races occupied 
quite distinct geographical areas. The Black Race held most 
Distribution of Africa south of the Sahara, southern India, 
of races New Guinea and the adjacent islands, and Aus- 

tralia. The Yellow Race held the north, east, and center of 









Race Portraiture of the Egyptians 

Paintings on the walls of royal tombs at Thebes. The Egyptians were painted red; the 
Semites from Palestine, yellow; the flat-nosed, thick-lipped, African negroes, black; and the 
fair-skinned Libyans, white, with blue eyes and blonde beards. Each racial type is also dis- 
tinguished by a peculiar dress. 



Asia, whence it spread over the Malay Archipelago, the islands 
of the Pacific, and the New World. The White Race was 
limited to Europe, northern Africa, and southwestern Asia. 
The last four centuries have seen a wonderful expansion of the 
White Race, which now forms the bulk of the population of 
North America, South America, South Africa, Australia, and 
New Zealand. 

Excepting the American negroes, the Black Race is still 



Languages of Man 21 

in the savage or in the barbarian stage of culture. The same 
holds true of the Yellow Race, with the important The White 
exceptions of the Chinese, Indo-Chinese, and Race 
Japanese. Civilization has been developed and history has 
been made chiefly by the White Race. 

7. Languages of Man 

The different types of language also took shape during the 
prehistoric period. The first languages must have been simple 
enough. Man doubtless eked out his imperfect Linguistic 
speech with expressive gestures and cries of alarm distinctions 
or passion, such as the lower animals make. But all this was 
very remote. The languages of even the lowest savages to-day 
are complex in structure and copious in vocabulary, thus indi- 
cating how far they have developed in the course of ages. 

The thousands of languages and dialects now spoken through- 
out the world belong to one or another of three groups. (1) 
Agglutinating languages show grammatical rela- classification 
tions by adding {glueing) sounds and syllables to of languages 
the main word. Thus the suffix lar in Turkish makes the plural 
(arkan, rope, arkanlar, ropes) ; the suffix lyk indicates quality 
(arkanlyk, the best kind of rope) ; and the suffix ly signifies 
possession (arkanly, with a rope, attached). English uses 
agglutination to a slight extent ; compare such words &sjust-ly, 
■loi-jitst-ly, care-less, care-less-ness. (2) Isolating languages show 
grammatical relations chiefly by the order of the words. Thus 
in Chinese the word la means " great," " greatness," " greatly," 
or " to enlarge," according to its position in the phrase. (3) 
Inflectional languages regularly employ conjugations and de- 
clensions tc set forth the relations of words to one another. 

These three linguistic groups have a fairly definite asso- 
ciation with the races of man. Agglutinating languages are 
most widely diffused, being spoken by the Black Distribution 
Race and by part of the Yellow Race. Isolating of languages 
languages are found only in Asia, among Chinese, Indo-Chinese, 
Tibetans, and Malays. Inflectional languages are confined to 
the While Race. 



2 2 



Prehistoric Times 



The languages of the White Race belong, with some excep- 
tions, to one or other of the three families. Least important, 
Hamitic historically, is the Hamitic family, named after 

languages Ham, a son of Noah {Genesis x, i, 6). Hamitic 
languages are still spoken in northern and eastern Africa, some 
of them by peoples who have more or less mixed with negroes. 
Ancient Egyptian was a Hamitic language. 




Distribution of 

SEMITIC and 

INDO-EUROPEAN PEOPLES 



The second family is that of the Semitic languages, so called 
from Shem, another son of Noah {Genesis, x, i, 22). Semitic- 
Semitic speaking peoples in antiquity included Baby- 
languages lonians, Assyrians, Hebrews, Phoenicians, and 
Arabs. To these must be added the Abyssinians of eastern 
Africa. The Semites, as the map shows, originally formed. a 
compact group, but Arabs are now found everywhere in north- 
ern Africa, while Hebrews (Jews) have spread all over the world. 

The third family is that of the Indo-European 1 languages. 
This name indicates that they are found in both India and 
Europe. The peoples using Indo-European languages in an- 



1 The alternative name "Aryan" is accurately applied only to the languages 
of the Hindus and the ancient Medes and Persians (Iranians). 



Writing and the Alphabet 23 

tiquity formed a widely extended group, which reached from 
India across Asia and Europe to the British Isles and Scandi- 
navia. Hindus in India, Medes and Persians Indo _ 
on the plateau of Iran, Greeks and Italians, and European 
the inhabitants of eastern and western Europe an s uages 
spoke related tongues. Their likeness is illustrated by the 
common words for relationship. Terms such as " father," 
" mother," " brother," and " daughter " occur with slight 
changes in form in nearly all the Indo-European languages. 
Thus, " father " in Sanskrit (the old Hindu language) is pilar, 
in ancient Persian, pidar, in Greek, pater, in Latin, pater, and 
in German, Voter. There must have been at one time a single 
speech from which all the Indo-European languages have 
descended. But where it was spoken, whether in Asia or in 
Europe, we cannot determine. 

8. Writing and the Alphabet 

The first steps toward writing are prehistoric. We start 
with the drawings and paintings made in the Palaeolithic Age. 
Man, however, could not rest satisfied with simple Picture 
representations of objects. He wanted to record writing 
thoughts and actions, and so his pictures tended to become 

1 2 3 4 5 

Various Signs of Symbolic Picture Writing 

x, "war" (Dakota Indian); 2, "morning" (Ojibwa Indian); 3, "nothing" (Ojibwa Indian); 
4 and s, "to eat " (Indian, Mexican, Egyptian, etc.). , 

symbols of ideas. The figure of an arrow might be used to in- 
dicate the idea of an " enemy," and two arrows directed against 
each other, the idea of a " fight." Many savage and barbarous 
peoples still have this symbolic picture writing. The American 
Indians employed it in most elaborate fashion. On rolls of 
birch bark or the skins of animals they wrote messages, stories, 
and songs and even preserved tribal annals extending over a 
century. 



24 Prehistoric Times 

A new stage in the development of writing was reached when 
the picture represented not an actual object or an idea, but 
Sound writ- a sound of the human voice. This difficult but ail- 
ing; the rebus important step appears to have been taken by 
means of the rebus. It is a way of expressing words by pic- 
tures of objects whose names resemble those words or the 
syllables in them. What makes the rebus possible is the fact 
that every language contains words having the same sound but 
different meanings. The old Mexicans, before the Spanish 
conquest, had gone so far as to write names of persons and 
places, rebus fashion. They represented the proper name, 
Itzcoatl, by the picture of a snake (coatl), with a number of 

Song (an ear 
Sun Moon Mountain Tall and a bird) Light 

o j) m $ <*A oj) 

* ^ * *M ft* 

Chinese Picture Writing and Later Conventional Characters 

It is possible in some cases to recognize the original pictures out of which Chinese writing 
developed. Thus the sun, originally a large circle with a dot in the center, became a crossed 
oblong, which the painter found easier to make with his brush. Chinese is the only living 
language in which such pictures have survived and still denote what they denoted in the 
beginning. 

knives (itz) projecting from its back. The Egyptian words for 
" sun" and " goose " were so nearly alike that the royal title, 
" Son of the Sun," could be suggested by grouping the pictures 
of the sun and a goose. Rebus making is still a common amuse- 
ment among children, but to early man it was a serious occu- 
pation. 

In the simplest form of sound writing each separate picture 
or symbol stands for the sound of an entire word ; hence there 
must be as many signs as there are words in the 
language. This is the case with Chinese writing. 
A dictionary of Chinese contains approximately twenty-five 
thousand words in good usage, every one represented by a 
separate written sign. No student ever learns them all, of 



Writing and the Alphabet 25 

course. It is enough for ordinary reading and writing to be 
familiar with four or five thousand signs. The Chinese seem 
to have entered upon the phonetic stage of writing in the 
second millennium B.C., and since then they have never im- 
proved upon it. 

A more developed form of sound writing arises when signs 
are employed for the sounds of separate syllables. All the 

words of a language may then be written with com- 

. , . Syllables 

paratively few signs. The Babylonians and Assyr- 
ians possessed in their cuneiform l writing signs for between 
four and five hundred syllables. Recent discoveries in Crete 
indicate that the ancient inhabitants of that island had a some- 
what similar system. The Japanese found it possible to 
express all the sounds in their language by forty-seven syllables, 
one standing for ro, another for fa, and so forth. The signs for 
these syllables were taken from Chinese writing. 

The final stage in the development of writing is reached 
when the separate sounds of the human voice are analyzed 
so far that each can be represented by a single 
letter. The Egyptians early made an alphabet. 
Unfortunately, they never abandoned their older methods of 
writing and learned to rely upon alphabetic signs alone. Egyp- 
tian hieroglyphs, 2 in consequence, are a curious jumble of object- 
pictures, symbols of ideas, and signs for entire words, separate 
syllables, and letters. The writing is a museum of all the steps 
in the progress of writing from the picture to the letter. 

As early, perhaps, as the tenth century B.C., the Phoenicians 
of western Asia were in possession of an alphabet. It con- 
sisted of twenty-two letters, each representing a Phoenician 
consonant. The Phoenicians appear to have alphabet 
borrowed their alphabetic signs, but whether from the Egyp- 
tians or the Cretans, or even in part from the Babylonians, 
remains uncertain. The Greeks, according to their own tradi- 
tions, imported the alphabet from Phoenicia and added signs 

1 Latin cuneus, "wedge." 

2 From the Greek words hieros, "holy," and glyphein, "to carve." The Egyp- 
tians regarded their signs as sacred. 



26 



Prehistoric Times 



fill 



yeai 



ifflpHiffl 



m 



mm. 






for vowels. The Greek form of the Phoenician alphabet sub- 
sequently spread to Italy, where the Romans received it, modi- 
fied some of the letters, and then passed it on to the peoples of 
western Europe. From them it has reached us. 1 

Two methods of writing developed in the ancient Orient. 
The Egyptians traced their hieroglyphic characters with a pen 
Methods an d a dark pigment upon papyrus. This river 

of writing reec [ g rows plentifully in the Nile marshes. It 
was cut into strips, which were then glued together at the 
edges to form a roll. 2 From papyros, the Greek name of the 

plant, has come our word 
Jl Ptet }■ ■■) I^tX " paper." Similarly, the 
Greek biblion, a (papyrus) 
book, reappears in our word 
" Bible," as well as in vari- 
ous words for " library " in 
European languages, such 
as the French bibliotheque 
and the German Bibliothek. 
The Babylonians impressed 
their cuneiform signs with a 
metal instrument on tablets 
of soft clay. The tablets 
were then baked hard in 
an oven. 3 The Babylonian 
method of writing survived 
for a time in the clay tablets 
of the Cretans and various 
Oriental peoples and in the 
waxen tablets of the Ro- 
mans. It subsequently disappeared. The Egyptian method of 
writing still survives in the pen, ink, and paper of modern usage. 
Before the invention of writing, and particularly of sound 
writing, men were unable to keep a full and accurate record of 

1 Our word "alphabet" comes from the names of the first two letters of the 
Greek alphabet — alpha (a) and beta (6). 

2 See the illustration on page 57. 3 See the illustration on page 56. 



<B 



ML 



JP : : 



Sim 



Cretan Writing 

A large tablet with linear script found in the 
palace at Gnossus, Crete. There are eight lines 
of writing, with a total of about twenty words. 
Notice the upright lines, which appear to mark 
the termination of each group of signs. 



Writing and the Alphabet 



27 



the past. Such information as they possessed had to be handed 
down by word of mouth from one generation to the next. 
Oral tradition, however, soon grows untrustworthy The record 
and often absolutely false, like a piece of village of the P ast 
gossip that has been many times retold. Writing alone enabled 
men widely separated in space and time to share a common 
knowledge and transmit it to future ages. Men now had a 



iu "* 



% ;v ?£&*!■ A3 fe 



^ 



s 




^•H«m<*<fdM«flf*5 



[»— .YTY 



«fT &Trr« 



rjm 



it ^ t*&4ig 4<sit aim 



Egyptian and Babylonian Writing 



Below the pictured hieroglyphs in the first line is the same text in a simpler writing known 
as hieratic. The two systems, however, were not distinct; they were as identical as our own 
printed and written characters. The third line illustrates old Babylonian cuneiform, in which 
the characters, like the hieroglyphs, are rude and broken-down pictures of objects. Derived 
from them is the later cuncifoim shown in lines four and five. 



record of the past which was exact, comprehensive, and ever 
growing with the growth of civilization. They now had a 
history. 

History, based on written records, begins in different coun- 
tries at varying dates. Some inscriptions found in Egypt reach 
back as far as the fourth millennium B.C. The Beginnings 
annals of Babylonia are probably less ancient. of history 
Trustworthy records in China and India do not extend beyond 
1000 B.C., while those of the Greeks and Romans are still later 
by several centuries. It was only after the opening of the 
Christian era that most European peoples began to emerge into 
the light of history. 



28 Prehistoric Times 

The whole historic age may be conveniently divided into 
three periods. Ancient history begins with Oriental peoples, 
Subdivisions who were the first to develop the arts of civi- 
of history lization, deals next with the Greeks, and ends 
with the Romans, who built up an empire embracing most of 
the civilized world. Medieval history is concerned with the 
peoples of eastern and western Europe. It includes a period 
of about a thousand years from the break-up of the Roman 
Empire at the end of the fifth century to the close of the fifteenth 
century. Modern history covers the last four hundred years 
and now embraces almost all mankind. It is no longer a his- 
tory of Asia or of Europe, but of the world. 

Studies 

i. Why has history been called the " biography of a society " ? 2. What do you 
understand by these terms: tribe, nation, rate, state, government? 3. Dis- 
tinguish between the three stages of savagery, barbarism, and civilization, and give 
instances of existing peoples in each stage. 4. Explain the abbreviations B.C. and 
a.d. In what century was the year 1921 B.C.? the year 1921 a.d? 5. On the map, 
page 4, trace the farthest descent of ice in Europe during the Ice Age. 6. What 
is meant by calling man the "tool-making animal"? 7. What stone implements 
have you ever seen? Who made them? Where were they? 8. Explain the 
terms Eolithic, Palaeolithic, and Neolithic. 9. Why should the discovery of fire 
be regarded as more significant than the discovery of steam? 10. Why has the 
invention of the bow-and-arrow been of greater importance than the invention of 
gunpowder? 11. How does the presence of few tameable animals in the New World 
help to account for its tardier development as compared with the Old World? 
12. "The history of metals in the hand of man is equivalent to the history of his 
higher culture." Comment on this statement. 13. Give examples of peoples 
widely different in blood who nevertheless speak the same language. 14. What is 
meant by oral tradition ? Why does it grow more and more unreliable in the course 
of time? 15. On an outline map indicate the areas occupied at the dawn of history 
by Semitic and Indo-European peoples. 16. Enumerate the most important con- 
tributions to civilization made in prehistoric times. 



CHAPTER II 

THE ANCIENT ORIENT 1 

9. The Lands of the Near East 

The ancient Orient included Asia and that part of Africa, 
called Egypt, which was formerly considered as belonging to 
Asia. Our study of Oriental history may, however, The Far 
omit consideration of the Far East. Wide seas, East 
extensive mountain ranges, and trackless deserts separated 
India, China, Indo-China, and Japan from the rest of Asia. 
India, indeed, did not remain entirely isolated in antiquity, 
for the northwestern part of the country was conquered first 
by the Persians and then by the Greeks. Even after the end 
of foreign rule, India continued to be of importance through its 
commerce in precious stones, ivory, fine woods, and cotton 
stuffs. China during ancient times also had some foreign trade 
and came to be known as the Silk Land (Serica) , from the silken 
goods which found their way into the markets of western Asia 
and Europe. But it was not until the nineteenth century of 
our era that the Far East emerged from age-long seclusion and 
began to take a really active part in world affairs. 

The boundaries of the Near East are the Black and Caspian 
seas on the north, the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, and Indian Ocean 
on the south, the Indus River on the east, and the The Near 
Mediterranean and the Nile on the west. This part East 
of Asia consists substantially of three vegetation belts, which 
are continued on a wider scale across the entire continent. 
First come the forests in the mountainous districts of Asia 
Minor, Armenia, and Iran (Persia). Next succeed the steppe 

'Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter i, "Three Oriental Peoples as 
Described by Herodotus"; chapter ii, "The Founders of the Persian Empire: 
Cyrus, Cambyscs, and Darius." 

29 



30 The Ancient Orient 

or grass lands, including a large part of the plateaus of Asia 
Minor, Iran, and Arabia. Finally, as the rainfall diminishes, 
the steppes become more and more arid and pass into semi- 
deserts and deserts, such as those of Syria and inner Arabia. 
The forest belt nourished a migratory, hunting folk. The 
steppe belt formed the home of nomadic, pastoral tribes. As 
for the desert belt, that was habitable only in oases. Nowhere 
could men settle down and adopt an agricultural life except 
where they were assured of a constant water supply and endur- 
ing sunlight. They found this assurance in the valleys of the 
Tigris-Euphrates and the Nile. 

Two famous rivers rise in the mountains of Armenia — the 
Tigris and the Euphrates. Flowing southward, they approach 
T T . . each other to form a common valley, proceed in 
and the parallel channels for the greater part of their course, 
Euphrates an( j Qn jy un j|- e shortly before reaching the Persian 
Gulf. In antiquity each river had a separate mouth. The 
soil which the Tigris and Euphrates bring down every year 
fills up the Persian Gulf at the rate of about three miles a 
century. Hence their delta was much less extensive five or 
six thousand years ago than it is to-day. 

This delta forms a plain anciently about one hundred and 

seventy miles long and rarely more than forty miles wide. In 

the Old Testament it is called the "land of Shinar" 

(Genesis, xi, 2). We know it better as Babylonia, 

after Babylon, which became its leading city and capital. 

The plain of Babylonia was once wonderfully fertile. The 
alluvial soil, when properly irrigated, yielded abundant harvests 

t> v 1 • of wheat, barley, and millet. The fruit of the date 

Babylonia a ' J ' 

seat of early palm provided a nutritious food. Although there 
civilization wag nQ stone ^ c } a y was everywhere. Molded into 

brick and afterwards dried in the sun, the clay became adobe, 
the cheapest building material imaginable. Nature, indeed, 
has done much for Babylonia. We can understand, therefore, 
why from prehistoric times people have been attracted to this 
region, and why it is here that we find a seat of early 
civilization. 



The Lands of the Near East 31 

Phe Nile is the longest of the great African rivers. The 
White Nile rises in the Nyanza lakes, flows clue north, and 
receives the waters of the Blue Nile near the modern 

.... ^ .... . , The Nile 

townoi Khartum, rrom this point the course of the 

river is broken by a series of five rocky rapids, misnamed 

cataracts, which can be shot by boats. The cataracts cease 

near the island of Philae, and Upper Egypt begins. It is a valley 

about five hundred miles long and about thirty miles wide. 

The strip of cultivable soil on each side of the river averages, 

however, only eight miles in width. Not far from modern 

Cairo the hills inclosing the valley fall away, the Nile divides 

into numerous branches, and the delta of Lower Egypt begins. 

The sluggish stream passes through a region of mingled swamp 

and plain, and at length by three principal mouths empties into 

the Mediterranean. 

Egypt owes her existence to the Nile. All Lower Egypt is 

a creation of the river by the gradual accumulation of sediment 

at its mouths. Upper Egvpt has been dug out of 

Egypt 

the desert sand and underlying rock by a process 

of erosion centuries long. The Nile once filled all the space 

between the hills that line its sides. Now it Hows through 

a thick layer of mud which has been deposited by the yearly 

inundation. 

In Egypt, as in Babylonia, every condition made it easy for 
people to live and thrive. The soil of Egypt, perhaps the mest 
fertile in the world, produced after irrigation three E 
crops of grain, flax, and vegetables a year. The of early 
wonderful date palm was a native tree. The clay civilization 
of the valley and easily worked stone from the near-by mountains 
provided building materials. The hot. dry climate enabled the 
inhabitants to get along with little shelter and clothing. The 
Xile provided them with a natural highway for domestic trade. 
Such favoring circumstances allowed the Egyptians to increase 
in numbers and to gather in populous communities. At a time 
when their neighbors, even the Babylonians, were still in the 
darkness of the prehistoric age, the Egyptians had entered the 
light of history. 



32 The Ancient Orient 

10. The Peoples of the Near East 

The Nile Valley appears to have been inhabited at a remote 
period by Neolithic men in the barbarian stage of culture. They 
Prehistoric made beautiful implements of polished flint, 
era in Egypt fashioned pottery, built in brick and stone, sailed 
boats on the Nile, introduced such useful animals as the buffalo, 
ass, and goat, and tilled the soil. In time, they began to smelt 
copper 1 and to write by means of phonetic signs. 2 Both 
metallurgy and sound writing arose in Egypt earlier than any- 
where else in the world. Like other barbarous peoples, the 
Neolithic Egyptians must have lived at first in separate tribes, 
under the rule of chiefs. As civilization advanced, the tribal 
organization gave way to city-states, that is, to small, in- 
dependent communities, each one centering about a town or 
a city. The city-states by 4000 B.C. had coalesced into two 
kingdoms, one in the Delta, the other in Upper Egypt. All this 
progress took place before the dawn of history. 

The Egyptians commenced keeping written records about 
3400 B.C. The date coincides pretty closely with that of the 
Dawn of union of Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt into a na- 
history in tional state, under a ruler named Menes. He was 
gyp thus the founder of that long line of kings, or 

"Pharaohs" (as they are called in the Bible), who for nearly 
three thousand years held sway over Egypt. The Pharaohs 
ruled at first from Memphis, near the head of the Delta, but 
later Thebes in Upper Egypt became the Egyptian capital. 

A study of the map shows that Egypt occupies an isolated 
situation, being protected by deserts on each side, by the Medi- 
The terranean on the north, and by the cataracts of the 

Egyptian Nile (impeding navigation) on the south. Thus 

ng om sheltered from the inroads of foreign peoples, the 
Egyptians enjoyed many centuries of quiet and peaceful 
progress. About 1800 B.C., however, they came for a time under 
the sway of barbarous Semitic tribes, called Hyksos, who 
entered Egypt through the isthmus of Suez. After the expulsion 

1 See page 15. 2 See page 25. 



The Peoples of the Near East 



33 



of the intruders, the Egyptians themselves began a career of 
conquest. The Pharaohs raised powerful armies, invaded 
Palestine, Phoenicia, and Syria, and extended their rule as far 
as the middle Euphrates. Even the islands of Cyprus and 
Crete seem to have become dependencies of Egypt. The 
conquered territories paid a heavy tribute of the precious 
metals and merchandise, while the forced labor of thousands of 
war captives enabled Rameses 
II (about 1292-1225 B.C.) and 
other Pharaohs to erect great 
monuments in every part of 
their realm. Gradually, how- 
ever, Egypt declined in warlike 
energy ; her Asiatic possessions 
fell away ; and the country 
itself in the sixth century B.C. 
became a part of the Persian 
Empire. The Egyptians re- 
mained under foreign masters 
from this time until our own 
day. 

The valley of the Tigris- 
Euphrates, unlike that of the 
Nile, was not iso- The Baby _ 
lated. It opened Ionian King- 
on extensive moun- om 
tain and steppe regions, the 
home of hunting or of pastoral 
peoples. Their inroads and migrations into the fertile plain 
of the two rivers formed a constant feature of Babylonian 
history. The earliest inhabitants of the " land of Shinar," 
about whom we know anything, were the Sumerians. They 
entered the country through the passes of the eastern or 
northern mountains, about four thousand years before Christ, 
gradually settled down to an agricultural life, and formed 
a number of independent city-states, each with its king and its 
patron god. After the Sumerians came Semitic-speaking peoples 




Head of Mummy of Rameses II 

Museum of Gizeh 

The mummy was discovered in 1881 in an 
underground chamber near the site of Thebes. 
With it were the coffins and bodies of more 
than a score of royal personages. Rameses II 
was over ninety years of age at the time of 
his death. In spite of the somewhat grotesque 
disguise of mummification, the face of this 
famous Pharaoh still wears an aspect of maj- 
esty and pride. 



34 The Ancient Orient 

from northern Arabia. Under a leader named Sargon (about 
2800 b.c) the Semites subdued the Sumerians and began to 
adopt their civilization. Sargon united all the Sumerian city- 
states. He also carried his victorious arms as far west as Syria 
and ruled over "the countries of the sea of the setting sun" 
(the Mediterranean). Sargon was, in fact, the first of the 
world conquerors. Many centuries later another great Semitic 
ruler, Hammurabi (about 2100 b.c), made his native city 
of Babylon, at first an obscure and unimportant place, the 
capital of what may hencefoith be called the Babylonian 
Kingdom. 

The region between the Mediterranean and the Arabian 

Desert contained in antiquity three small countries: Syria, 

Phoenicia, and Palestine. Their situation made 

Aro.niiE3.ris 

them the great highway of the Near East, and 
through them ran the caravan routes connecting the Nile with 
the Euphrates. The inhabitants spoke Semitic languages 
and probably came from northern Arabia. They are known 
as Aramaeans or Syrians, Phoenicians, and Hebrews. None 
of these peoples ever played a leading part in Oriental history, 
but each made important contributions to Oriental civilization. 
The Aramaeans were keen business men, who bought and sold 
throughout western Asia. The language of the Aramaeans in 
this way became widely diffused and eventually displaced 
Hebrew as the ordinary speech in Palestine. Some parts of the 
Old Testament are written in Aramaic. The chief center of 
the Aramaeans was Damascus, one of the oldest cities in the 
world and still a thriving place. 

The Phoenicians occupied a narrow stretch of coast, about 
one hundred and twenty miles in length and seldom more than 
twelve miles in width, between the Lebanon Moun- 
tains and the sea. This tiny land could not support 
a large population by farming, so the Phoenicians became a 
nation of sailors. They found in the cedars of Lebanon a soft, 
white wood for shipbuilding, and in the Egyptian vessels which 
had been entering their harbors for centuries a model for their 
own craft. The great Phoenician cities of Sidon and Tyre long 



The Peoples of the Near East 35 

maintained an extensive commerce throughout the Mediter- 
ranean. 1 

The Hebrews lived south of the Aramaeans and the Phoenicians. 
Hebrew history begins with the immigration of The 
twelve tribes (called Israelites) into Palestine. Hebrews 
Here they gave up the life of wandering shepherds and became 
farmers and townsmen. Their twelve tribes at first formed 
only a loose and weak confederacy. The sole authority was 
that held by valiant chieftains and law-givers, such as Samson, 
Gideon, and Samuel, who served as 
judges between the people and often 
led them against their foes. 

Toward the close of the eleventh 
century B.C. the Hebrew tribes united 
into one kingdom, under a The He _ 
ruler named Saul. His reign brew King- 
was filled with constant 
struggles against the warlike Philistines, 
who occupied the southwestern coast A Philistine 

of Palestine. David, Saul's successor, ^ E syp tian P aintin g- 

overthrew the Philistine power. For a capital city David 
selected the ancient fortress of Jerusalem, which henceforth 
became for the Hebrews the center of their national life. The 
reign of David's son, Solomon (about 955-925 B.C.), formed 
the most splendid period in Hebrew history. Solomon's 
authority reached from the peninsula of Sinai northward to 
the Lebanon Mountains and the Euphrates. He married an 
Egyptian princess, a daughter of the reigning Pharaoh. , He 
joined with Hiram, king of Tyre, in trading expeditions on the 
Red Sea and Indian Ocean. The same monarch supplied him 
with skilled Phoenician workmen, who built at Jerusalem a 
splendid temple for the worship of Jehovah. 

After Solomon's death the ten northern tribes set Division of 
up an independent kingdom of Israel, with its capital ^. e Hebrew 
at Samaria. The two southern tribes, Judah and 
Benjamin, formed the kingdom of Judea and remained faithful 

1 See page 47. 




36 The Ancient Orient 

to the successors of Solomon. These small states led a troubled 
existence for several centuries. The Assyrians finally conquered 
Israel, and the Babylonians, Judea. Both states in the end 
were added to the Persian Empire. 




Solomon's Kingdom 

The supposed route of the Hebrew Exodus from Egypt through the peninsula of Sinai to 
the border of Palestine is traced on the map. 

North of Babylonia and on each side of the Tigris River lay 
Assyria. The inhabitants spoke a Semitic language akin to 
Rise of Babylonian. Their chief city was at first Assur 

Assyria (whence the name Assyria), and afterward the larger 

and more splendid Nineveh. They were a rough, hardy people, 
devoted to hunting and warlike exercises. Having adopted 



The Peoples of the Near East 



37 



the horse and military chariot, and later iron weapons, the 
Assyrians began a series of sweeping conquests. Their power 
culminated during the eighth and seventh centuries before 
Christ. The kings who then reigned at Nineveh created a 
dominion reaching from the neighborhood of the Black and 
Caspian seas to the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea, and the Nile. 
One of the greatest of these Assyrian monarchs was Sennacherib 
(705-681 B.C.), whose name is 
familiar from the references to 
him in the Old Testament. 

Force built up the Assyrian state 
and only force could hold it to- 
gether. When, there- Collapse of 
fore, it declined in Assyria 
strength, the subject countries 
made ready to strike a blow for 
freedom. The storm broke in 606 
B.C. In that year the king of 
Babylon and the king of the Medes 
and Persians moved upon Nineveh, 
captured the city, and utterly de- 
stroyed it. 

The victors now divided the 
spoils. Media secured most of As- 
syria proper, together Partition of 
with the long stretch Assyria 
of mountain country extending from the Persian Gulf to 
Asia Minor. Babylonia obtained the western part of the 
Assyrian domains, all the way to the Mediterranean. Under 
Nebuchadnezzar (604-561 B.C.), Babylonia again became a great 
power in the Orient. It was Nebuchadnezzar who brought 
the kingdom of Judea to an end, captuted Jerusalem, burned 
Solomon's Temple, and carried away many Hebrews into cap- 
tivity. All this story is related in the Old Testament. 

Not much earlier than the break-up of Assyria, we find a new 
and vigorous people pressing into western Asia. They were 
the Persians, near kinsmen of the Medes, and like them of 




An Assyrian 

A bas-relief found at Nineveh. The 
original is colored. 



3§ 



The Ancient Orient 



Indo-European speech. The able ruler whom history knows 
as Cyrus the Great (553-529 B.C.) united the Persians and the 
Formation Medes under his sway and then conquered the king- 
of the Per- dom of Lydia in Asia Minor. He also subdued Baby- 
sian mpire ^ on ^ a> -jhe Hebrew exiles there were now allowed 
to return to their native land. His son, Cambyses, annexed 
Egypt. The successor of Cambyses, Darius the Great (521- 
485 B.C.), added northwestern India to the Persian dominions, 
together with some territory in Europe. Not without reason 
could Darius describe himself in an inscription as "the great 
king, king of kings, king of countries, king of all men." 




An Assyrian Lion Hunt 

British Museum, London 
A bas-relief found in the palace of Assurbanipal at Nineveh. 

The Persian Empire extended over an enormous area. Its 
eastern and western frontiers were nearly three thousand miles 
Extent of apart, or considerably more than the distance be- 
the Persian tween New York and San Francisco. Its northern 
mpire and southern boundaries were almost as remote. 

With the exception of Arabia, which the Persians never 
attempted to conquer, the Near East from the Indus to the 
Danube and the Nile yielded allegiance to the Great King. 

It was the work of Darius to establish a stable government, 
which should preserve what the sword had won. The problem 
was difficult, for the Persians had conquered many peoples 



The Peoples of the Near East 



39 



unlike in race, language, customs, and religion. Darius did 

not try to weld them into unity. As long as his subjects 

paid tribute and furnished soldiers, they were al- Organiza- 

lowed to manage their affairs with little interfer- ^ on ? f the 
° . Persian 

ence. The entire empire, excluding Persia proper, Empire 
was divided into about twenty prov- 
inces, each with governors to collect 
taxes and command the provincial 
armies. Darius also provided special 
agents whose business it was to travel 
thioughout the empire and investi- 
gate the conduct of the royal officials. 
As a further means of holding his 
dominions together, Darius laid out 
military roads for the dispatch of 
troops and supplies. The Royal 
Road 1 from Susa, the Persian capital, 
to Sardis in Lydia was about sixteen 
hundred miles long; but government 
couriers, using relays of fresh horses, 
could cover the distance within a 
week. It is interesting to note that 
the present railroad from Constanti- 
nople to Bagdad in large part parallels 
this ancient highway. 

Oriental history has now been traced 
from its beginnings to about 500 B.C. 
We have seen how the Political 

earliest civilized societies deveiop- 

ment of the 
appeared in the valleys of ancient 

the Nile and the Tigris- 0rient 

Euphrates; how empire building fi 

Started J and how at length ncarlv nobles, one carrying the royal fan, 

all the Near East came together in the other the royal parasol. 

the widespread Persian Empire. This work of unification 

was accomplished only at a fearful cost. The recordr. of 

1 Sec the map between pages 34~35- 




Darius with His Attend- 
ants 

Bas-relief at Persepolis. The 
monarch's right hand grasps a staff 
or scepter; his left hand, a bunch 
of flowers. His head is surmounted 
by a crown ; his body is enveloped 
in the long Median mantle. Above 
the king is a representation of the 
divinity which guarded and guided 



40 The Ancient Orient 

Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, and Persia, not to speak of minor 
countries, are a terrible story of towns and cities given to 
the flames, of the devastation of fertile regions, of the 
slaughter of men, women, and children, of the enslavement 
of entire populations. Mankind by this time had passed 
from the petty robbery, murder, and border feuds character- 
istic of savagery and barbarism to organized warfare, in which 
state was ranged against state and nation against nation. 
Peace, indeed, formed the rare exception in the ancient Orient. 
Consequently, there could be no such thing as international 
law regulating the relations of one community to another and 
no conception of international cooperation for human welfare. 
Each community looked out for itself; each one, if it could, 
subdued its neighbors and imposed its rule upon them. Never- 
theless, Oriental peoples made much progress in social and 
economic conditions, in law and morality, in religion, literature, 
art, science, and other fields of activity during the first thirty 
centuries of recorded history. 

11. Social Conditions 

Nothing like democracy existed in the ancient Orient. The 
common people never shared in the government as voters and 
lawmakers ; they knew only monarchical rule. The 
king, especially in Egypt, was considered to be 
the earthly representative of the gods. Even in a Pharaoh's 
lifetime temples were erected to him and offerings were made 
to his sacred majesty. The belief in the king's divinity led 
naturally to the conclusion that he deserved the unquestioning 
obedience of his subjects. The king was therefore an autocrat, 
exercising absolute, irresponsible authority. He had many 
duties. He was judge, commander, and high priest, all in one. 
In time of war, he led his troops and faced the perils of the battle- 
field. During intervals of peace, he was occupied with a con- 
stant round of sacrifices, prayers, and processions, which could 
not be omitted without exciting the anger of the gods. To 
his courtiers he gave frequent audience, hearing complaints, 
settling disputes, and issuing commands. A conscientious 



Social Conditions 



4i 



monarch, such as Hammurabi, who describes himself as "a 
real father to his people," must have been a very busy man. 

Oriental monarchs always maintained luxurious courts. The 
splendor of Rameses II, of Solomon, of Sennacherib, of Nebu- 
chadnezzar, dazzled their contemporaries. Royal The royal 
magnificence reached its height with the Great King court 
of Persia. He lived far removed from the common eye in the 
recesses of a lordly palace. When he 'gave audience to his 
nobles, he sat on a gold and ivory throne. When he traveled, 
even on military expeditions, he carried with him costly fur- 
niture, gold and silver dishes, and gorgeous robes. About him 




Court of the Pharaoh 

Wall painting, from a tomb at Thebes. Shows a Pharaoh receiving Asiatic envoys bear- 
ing tribute. They are introduced by white-robed Egyptian officials. The Asiatics may be 
distinguished by their gay clothes and black, sharp-pointed beards. 

were hundreds of servants, bodyguards, and officials. All who 

approached his person prostrated themselves in the dust. 

"Whatsoever he commandeth them, they do. If he bid them 

make war, the one against the other, they do it ; if he send them 

out against his enemies they go, and break down mountains, 

walls, and towers. They slay and are slain, and transgress 

not the king's commandment." ' 

The aristocratic or noble class included large landowners, 

rich merchants and bankers, and especiallv high 

Nobles 
government officials. These persons were often very 

powerful. If the king failed to keep on good terms with them, 

1 I Esdras, iv, 3-5. 



42 



The Ancient Orient 



they might at any time rise in revolt and perhaps dethrone him. 
Oriental history relates many insurrections against the reigning 
monarch. 

The priestly class also exerted much influence. Priests 
conducted the temple worship and acted as intermediaries 
between men and the gods. They were likewise 
scholars, who collected the old traditions and 
legends and set them down in writing; scientists, who in- 
vestigated Nature's secrets ; and teachers in the schools con- 
nected with the temples. The priesthoods accumulated much 



Priests 




Tax Collecting in Ancient Egypt 

On the left three villagers, who have failed to pay their taxes, are being brought in by 
officers. The latter carry staves. On the right sit the scribes, holding in one hand a sheet 
of papyrus and in the other hand a pen. The scribes kept records of the amount owed by 
each taxpayer and issued receipts when the taxes were paid. 

property, particularly in Egypt, where about a third of all the 
tillable land came under their control. 

The middle class included chiefly shopkeepers and pro- 
fessional men such as physicians, notaries, and scribes. Though 
Middle regarded as inferiors, still there was a chance for 

class them to rise in the world. If they became rich, they 

might hope to enter the priesthood or even the exalted ranks 
of the nobility. 

No such hope encouraged the day laborer. His lot was 
poverty and unending toil. The artisan received a wage 
Artisans and scarcely sufficient to keep him and his family from 
peasants starvation, while the peasant, after paying ex- 
cessive rents and taxes on his farm, had left only a bare 
subsistence. 



Social Conditions 



43 



The slaves occupied the base of the social pyramid. Every 
Oriental people possessed them. At first, they were prisoners 
of war, who, instead of being slaughtered, were 
forced to labor for their masters. Oriental rulers 
undertook military expeditions for the express purpose of 
gathering slaves — "like the sand," says an ancient writer. 
Persons unable to pay their debts often lost their freedom. 




Transport of an Assyrian Colossus 

British Museum, London 

A slab from a gallery of Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh. The immense block (an image 
of a human-headed bull or lion) is being dragged by slaves, who work under the lash. 



Criminals, also, were sometimes compelled to enter into ser- 
vitude. The treatment of slaves depended on the character of 
their master. A cruel and overbearing master might make 
life a burden for them. Slaves had plenty to do. They re- 
paired dikes, dug irrigation ditches, erected temples and palaces, 
labored in the mines, served as oarsmen in ships, and engaged 
in many household activities. In Babylonia and Assyria, where 
the servile class was more numerous than in Egypt, the whole 
structure of societv rested on the backs of slaves. 



44 



The Ancient Orient 



Agriculture 



12. Economic Conditions 

Such fruitful, well-watered valleys as those of the Nile and 
the Euphrates encouraged agricultural life. Wheat, barley, 
and millet were first domesticated either in Egypt 
or in Babylonia. There is good reason, indeed, for 
believing that these most important cereals, together with 
domesticated cattle, were introduced into Neolithic Europe 
from the Near East. 1 All the methods of farming are pictured 
for us on Egyptian monuments. We mark the peasant as he 
breaks up the earth with a hoe or plows a shallow furrow with 
a sharp-pointed stick. We see the sheep being driven across 




Plowing and Sowing in Ancient Egypt 

The picture shows from left to right a scribe, two plowmen, one holding the plow and one 
driving the oxen, a man with a hoe, who breaks up the clods left by the plow, and a sower 
scattering seed from a bag. 

sown fields to trample the seed into the moist soil. We watch 
the patient laborers as with sickles they gather in the harvest 
and then with heavy flails separate the chaff from the grain. 
Although their methods were clumsy, ancient farmers raised 
immense crops. The soil of Egypt and Babylonia not only 
supported a dense population, but also supplied food for neigh- 
boring countries. These two regions were the granaries of the 
Near East. 

Blacksmiths, carpenters, stonecutters, weavers, potters, 
glass-blowers, and workers in ivory, silver, and gold were found 

„ , in every Oriental city. The creations of these 

Industry . 

ancient craftsmen often exhibit remarkable skill. 

Egyptian linens were so wonderfully fine and transparent as 

1 See page 14. 



Economic Conditions 45 

to merit the name of "woven air." Egyptian glass, with its 
lines of different hues, was much prized. Babylonian tapestries, 
carpets, and rugs enjoyed a high reputation for beauty of 
design and coloring. Some of the industrial arts thus practiced 
thousands of years ago have been revived only in modern times. 
The development of arts and crafts made it necessary for 
merchants to collect manufactured products where they could 
be readilv bought and sold. The cities of Babv- 

1 • • • 1 1 1_ • • . 1 Trade 

Ionia, in particular, became thriving markets. 
Partnerships between tradesmen were not uncommon. We 
even learn of commercial companies not so very unlike our 
present corporations. Business life in Babylonia wore, indeed, 
quite a modern look. 

Metallic money first circulated in the form of rings and 
bars. The Egyptians had small pieces of gold — "cow gold" 
— each of which was simplv the value of a full- 

Money 

grown cow. Jt was necessary to weigh the metal 
whenever a purchase took place. A common picture on the 
Egyptian monuments is that of the weigher with his balance 
and scales. Then the practice arose of stamping each piece 
of money with its true value and weight. The next step was 
coinage proper, where the government guarantees, not only 
the weight, but also the genuineness of the metal. The honor 
of inventing coinage belongs to the Lydians of Asia Minor, 
whose country was well supplied with the precious metals. 
The kings of Lydia began to coin money as early as the eighth 
century B.C. The Greek neighbors of Lydia quickly adopted 
the art of coinage and so introduced it into Europe. 1 

The use of money as a medium of exchange led naturally to 
a system of banking. One great banking house, established 
at Babylon before the time of Sennacherib, carried on 
operations for several centuries. Hundreds of legal 
documents belonging to this firm have been discovered in the 
huge earthenware jars which served as safes. The temples 
in Babylonia also received money on deposit and loaned it 

1 For illustrations of Oriental, Greek, and Roman coins, sec the plate facing page 
148. 



46 The Ancient Orient 

out again, as do our modern banks- Babylonian business 
usages and credit devices spread through Asia Minor to Greece 
and thence into other European countries. 

13. Commerce and Commercial Routes 

Commerce, which has always been a means of enabling 
different peoples to know and influence one another, was in 
Beginnings eai "ly times exposed to many dangers. Wild tribes 
of com- and bands of robbers infested the roads and obliged 

the traveler to be ever on guard against their at- 
tacks. Travel by water had also its drawbacks. Boats were 
small and easily swamped in rough weather. With a single sail 
and few oarsmen, progress was very slow. Without compass 
or chart, the navigator seldom ventured into the open sea. 
He hugged the coast as closely as possible, keeping always a 
sharp eye for pirates who might seize his vessel and take him 
into slavery. In spite of all these risks, the profits of foreign 
trade were so great that much intercourse existed between 
Oriental lands. 

The Egyptians, pioneers in so many fields of human activity, 
are believed to have made the first seagoing ships. As 
Egyptian early as the thirtieth century B.C., they began to 
commerce venture out into the eastern Mediterranean and to 
carry on a thriving trade with both Cyprus and Crete, which 
lay almost opposite the mouths of the Nile. The ships of the 
Pharaohs also sailed up and down the entire length of the Red 
Sea. 

The cities of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley were admirably 
situated for commerce, both by sea and land. The shortest 
Asiatic way by water from India skirted the southern coast 

commerce f j ran anc ^ p ass ing up the Persian Gulf, gained the 
valley of the two rivers. Even more important were the over- 
land roads for caravan trade from India and China. They 
converged at Babylon and Nineveh and then radiated west- 
ward to Asia Minor, Syria, Phoenicia, Palestine, and Egypt. 
All these routes have been arteries of commerce from pre- 
historic times. Manv of them are in use even to-dav. 



Commerce and Commercial Routes 47 

A Semitic people, the Phoenicians, 1 were the common carriers 
of the Mediterranean after about 1000 B.C. Phoenician water 
routes soon extended to Cyprus, only a short dis- Phoenician 
tance away, then to Crete, then to the islands of the water routes 
/Egean, and, at least occasionally, to the coasts of the Black 
Sea. When the Phoenicians were finally driven from these 
regions by the rising power of the Greek states, they sailed 
farther westward and established trading posts in Sicily, Sar- 
dinia, North Africa, and Spain. At length they passed through 
the strait of Gibraltar into the stormy Atlantic and visited 
the shores of western Europe and Africa. 

The Phoenicians obtained a great variety of products as 
a result of their commercial voyages. The mines of Spain 
yielded iron, tin, lead, and silver. Tin, which was Phoenician' 
especially valuable because of its use in making imports and 
bronze, seems also to have been brought from south- expor s 
western Britain (Cornwall), where mines of this metal are still 
productive. From Africa came ivory, ostrich feathers, and 
gold; from Arabia, which the Phoenicians also visited, came 
incense, perfumes, and costly spices. These commodities 
found a ready sale throughout the Near East. Still other 
products were imported directly into Phoenicia to provide raw 
materials for her flourishing manufactures. The fine carpets 
and glassware, the artistic works in silver and bronze, and the 
beautiful purple cloths produced in Phoenician factories were 
exported to every part of the known world. 

The Phoenicians were the boldest sailors of antiquity. Some 
of their long voyages are still on record. We learn from the 
Old Testament that they made cruises on the Red p . . . 
Sea and Indian Ocean and brought the gold of Ophir, voyages of 
"four hundred and twenty talents," to Solomon. 2 ex P loration 
There is even a story of certain Phoenicians who, by direction 
of an Egyptian king, explored the eastern coast of Africa, 
rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and after three years' absence 
returned to Egypt through the strait of Gibraltar. A much more 
probable narrative is that of the voyage of Hanno, a Carthaginian 

1 See page 34. 2 Sec 1 Kings, ix, 26-28. 



48 The Ancient Orient 

admiral. We still possess a Greek translation of his interesting 
log book. It describes an expedition made about 500 B.C. 
along the western coast of Africa. The explorers seem to have 
sailed as far as the Gulf of Guinea. 1 Nearly two thousand 
years elapsed before Portuguese navigators undertook a similar 
voyage to the Dark Continent. 




A Phoenician War Galley 

From a slab found at Nineveh in the palace of the Assyrian king, Sennacherib. The vessel 
shown is a bireme with two decks. On the upper deck are soldiers with their shields hanging 
over the side. The oarsmen sit on the lower deck, eight at each side. The crab catching the 
fish is a humorous touch. 

Wherever the Phoenicians went, they established settlements. 
Most of these were merely trading posts which contained ware- 
Phoenician houses for the storage of goods. Here the shy 
settlements natives came to barter their raw materials for the 
finished products — cloths, tools, weapons, wine, and oil — 
which the strangers from the east had brought with them. 
Phcenician settlements sometimes grew into large and flourishing 
cities. Gades in southern Spain, which was the most distant 
of their colonies, survives to this day as Cadiz, one of the very 
oldest cities in Europe. Carthage, founded in North Africa by 
colonists from Tyre, became the commercial mistress of the 
western Mediterranean. Carthaginian history, as we shall learn, 
has many points of contact with that of the Greeks and Romans. 

1 See the map, page 10S. 



Law and Morality 
14. Law and Morality 



49 



Human activities in the Near East seem to have gone on in 
orderly fashion much of the time. As far as we can tell, life 
was fairly safe, property was reasonably secure, and Egyptian 
people were protected in their occupations. Egypt, law 
we know, had courts of justice, law books (unfortunately lost), 
and definite rules relating to contracts, loans, leases, mortgages, 
partnerships, marriage, and the family. The position of woman 



i,wmiiiimniwnii»ii/innifiw»iw^^ 




The Judgment of the Dead 

From a papyrus containing the Book of the Dead. The illustration shows a man and his 
wife (at the Lft) entering the hall in the spirit world, where sits the god of the dead with 
forty-two jurors (seen above) as his assistants. The heart of the man, symbolized by a jar, 
is being weighed in balances by a jackal-headed god against a feather, the symbol of truth. 
An ibis-headed god records with his pen the verdict of the balances. The monster in the 
right-hand corner is ready to devour the soul, if the heart proves to be lighter than the feather. 
This picture is by far the oldest known representation of a judgment scene. 

was remarkably high: she had full rights of ownership and 
inheritance and she could engage in business on her own account. 
Though polygamy existed, chiefly among the upper classes, the 
wife was her husband's companion and not merely his domestic 
servant. The reverence due from children to father and mother 
was constantly insisted upon, and filial piety for the Egyptians 
ranked among the highest virtues. 

The most enlightening notice of Egyptian moral standards 
is found in a very ancient work known as the Book oj the Dead. 
One of the chapters describes the judgment of the soul in the 
other world. If the soul was to enjoy a blissful immortality, 




50 The Ancient Orient 

it must be able to recite truthfully before its judges a so-called 
Negative Confession. These are some of the declarations: "I 
The Nega- °^ not stea l " > ' I did no t rnurder " ; "I did not lie'* ; 
tive Confes- "T did not kill any sacred animals"; "I did not 
damage any cultivated land"; "I did not do anv 
witchcraft" ; "I did not blaspheme a god" ; "T did not make 
false accusations" ; "I did not revile my father" ; "I did not 
cause a slave to be ill-treated by bis master" ; "I did not make 
any one weep." After pleading innocence of all the fortv-two 
sins condemned by Egyptian ethics, the soul added, '"Grant 

___ that he may come 

v . x-'^i^^ untovou . . . he that 
hath given bread to 
the hungry and drink 
to the thirsty, and 
that hath clothed 
the naked with gar- 
ments." Some of 
the clauses of the 
Negative Confession 
correspond with some of the Ten Commandments, while the 
afhrmative statement at the end makes a close approach to 
Christian morality. 

The Babylonians were a very legal-minded people. When 
a man sold his wheat, bought a slave, married a wife, or made 
Babylonian a will, the transaction was duly noted on a contract 
law tablet, which was then hied away in the public 

archives. Instead of inscribing his name, a Babylonian 
stamped his seal on the soft clay of the tablet. Even* one 
who owned property had to have a seal. A contract tablet 
was protected from defacement by being placed in a hollow 
clay case, or envelope. 

A recent discovery has provided us with almost the complete 
text of the laws which Hammurabi, the Babylonian king, or- 
Code of dered engraved on stone monuments and set up 

Hammurabi ^ the chid dtie5 rf ^ realm Hammurabi's 

code shows, in general, a keen sense of justice. A man 



Babvloxiax Seal 

? £ :: -_:- - I — i: rtir^rf a": :u: :::: ;.: 



Law and Morality 



51 



who tries to bribe a witness or a judge is to be severely pun- 
ished. A farmer who is careless with his dikes and allows the 
water to run through and flood his neighbor's land must restore 
the value of the grain he has damaged. The owner of a vicious 
ox which has gored a man must 
pay a heavy fine, provided he 
knew the disposition of the ani- 
mal and had not blunted its 
horns. On the other hand, the 
code contains some rude fea- 
tures, especially its reliance upon 
retaliation — "eye for eye, tooth 
for tooth" — as the punishment 
of injuries. For instance, a son 
who struck his father was to 
have his hands cut off. The 
nature of the punishment de- 
pended, moreover, on the rank 
of the aggrieved party. A per- 
son who had caused the loss of 
a "gentleman's"' eye was to 
have his own plucked out ; but 
if the injury was done to a poor 
man, the culprit had only to 
pay a fine. Hammurabi's code 
thus presents a vivid picture of 
Babylonian society twenty-one 
centuries before Christ. 

The laws which we find in the 
earlier part of the Old Testament were ascribed by the Hebrews 
to Moses. The Bible states that he had received them from 
Jehovah on Mount Sinai. These laws covered a The Mosiac 
wide range of subjects. They fixed all religious code 
ceremonies, required the observance every seventh day of the 
Sabbath, gave numerous and complicated rules for sacrifices, 
and even indicated what foods must be avoided as "unclean." 
No other ancient people possessed so elaborate a legal system. 




Hammurabi and the Sun God 
British Museum, London 
A shaft of stone, nearly S feet high, 
contains the code of Hammurabi. The 
monument was found on the site of Susa in 
1901-1902. It is engraved in 44 columns 
and over 3600 lines. A relief at the top 
shows the Babylonian king receiving the 
laws from the sun god, who is seated at 
the right. Flames rising from the god's 
shoulders indicate his solar character. 



52 



The Ancient Orient 



The Jews, throughout the world, still follow its precepts. And 
modern Christendom still recites the Ten Commandments, the 
noblest summary of the rules of right living that has come 
down to us from Oriental antiquity. 

15. Religion 

Oriental ideas of religion, even more than of law and morality, 
were the gradual outgrowth of beliefs which arose in prehistoric 
Nature times. Everywhere nature worship prevailed. The 

worship vault of heaven, earth and ocean, and sun, moon, 

and stars were all regarded as themselves divine or as the abode 
of divinities. The sun formed an object of particular adoration. 

We find a sun god, 
under different names, 
throughout the Orient. 
The Egyptians, very 
conservative in religious 
matters, al- 







fllgfifl 



u^s^^^m 



An Egyptian Scarab 




Animal 
worship 



ways 



The beetle, as a symbol of birth and resurrection, and 
hence of immortality, enjoyed much reverence in ancient 
Egypt. A scarab, or image of the beetle, was often worn 
as a charm and was placed in the mummy as an arti- 
ficial heart. 



tained the animal wor- 
ship of their barbarous 
ancestors. Some gods 
were represented on 
monuments in partly 
animal form, one hav- 
ing a baboon's head, another the head of a lioness, another 
that of a cat. Such animals as the jackal, bull, ram, hawk, 
and crocodile also received the utmost reverence, less for them- 
selves, however, than as symbols of different gods. 

In Babylonia and Assyria a belief in the existence of evil 
spirits formed a prominent feature of the religion. People 
supposed themselves to be constantly surrounded 
by a host of demons, who caused insanity, sickness, 
accidents, and death — all human ills. 

To cope with these spiritual enemies the Baby- 
lonian used magic. He put up an image of a pro- 
tecting god at the entrance of his home and wore charms upon 



Evil spirits 



Magic 



Religion 



53 



Divination 



Astrology 



his person. If he fell ill, he summoned a magician to recite an 
incantation which would drive out the demon inside him. 

The Babylonians had many ways of predicting the future. 
Soothsayers divined from dreams and from the casting of lots. 
Omens of prosperity or misfortune were also drawn 
from the appearance of the entrails of animals slain 
in sacrifice. For this purpose a sheep's liver was commonly 
used. Divination by the liver was studied for centuries in the 
temple schools of Babylonia. The practice afterwards spread 
to the Greeks and Romans. 

Astrology received much attention in Babylonia. The five 
planets then recognized, as well as comets and eclipses, were 
thought to exercise an influence for good or evil on 
the life of man. Babylonian astrology passed to 
western lands and became popular in much of Europe. When 
we name the days Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, we are 
unconscious astrologers, for in old 
belief the first day belonged to the 
planet Saturn, the second to the sun, 
and the third to the moon. 1 People 
who try to read their fate in the 
stars are really practicing an art of 
Babylonian origin. 

In the midst of so many nature 
deities, sacred animals, and evil 
spirits, it was indeed re- Monothe- 
markable that the belief ism in Egypt 
in one god should ever have arisen. 
Nevertheless, some Egyptian thinkers 
reached the idea of a single supreme stone and undoubtedly a striking 

]. . . s\ c ,1 t->i i likeness of the Egyptian king. 

divinity. One of the Pharaohs, 

Amenhotep IV (about 1375-1358 B.C.), who saw in the sun the 
source of all life on the earth, ordered his subjects to worship 
that luminary alone. The names of other gods were erased 




Amenhotep IV 

A portrait head carved in lime- 



1 The names of the other weekdays come from the names of old Teutonic deities. 
Tuesday i.s the day of Tiu (the Teutonic Mars), Wednesday of Woden (Mercury), 
Thursday of Thor (Jupiter), and Friday of the goddess Frigg (Venus). 



54 The Ancient Orient 

from the monuments, their images destroyed, their temples 
closed, their priests expelled. No such lofty faith had ever 
appeared before, but it was too abstract and impersonal to win 
popular favor. After the king's death, the old deities were 
restored to honor. 

The Medes and Persians accepted the religious teachings of 
Zoroaster, a great prophet whose date is variously placed between 
Monothe- IOO ° anc ^ 7°° B - c - According to Zoroaster, Ahura- 
ism in mazda, the heaven-deity, is the maker and upholder 

of the universe. Heisagodof light and order, of truth 
and purity. Against him stands Ahriman, the personification 
of darkness and evil. These rival powers are engaged in a 
ceaseless struggle. Man, by doing right and avoiding wrong, 
by loving truth and hating falsehood, can help make Good 
triumph over Evil. In the end Ahuramazda will overcome 
Ahriman and will reign supreme over a righteous world. 
Zoroastrianism was the only monotheistic religion developed 
by an Indo-European people. It still survives in some parts 
of Persia, though that country is now chiefly Mohammedan, 
and also among the Parsees (Persians) of Bombay, India. 

The Hebrews, a Semitic people, also developed a monotheistic 
religion. The Old Testament shows how it came about. 
Hebrew Jehovah was at first regarded by the Hebrews as 
monotheism s i m ply their own national deity ; they did not deny 
the existence of the deities of other nations, though they re- 
fused to worship them. The prophets, from the eighth century 
onwards, began to transform this narrow, limited conception. 
For them, Jehovah was the God of the whole earth, the Father 
of all mankind. After the Hebrews returned to Palestine from 
captivity in Babylon, 1 the sublime faith of the prophets gradually 
spread through the entire nation, culminating in the doctrine 
of Jesus that God is a Spirit and that they who worship him 
must worship him in spirit and in truth. The Christian doctrine 
of God is thus directly an outgrowth of Hebrew monotheism. 

The Egyptians, as well as all other ancient peoples, believed 
that man has a soul which survives the death of the body. 

1 See page 38. 



Literature and Art 55 

They thought it essential, however, to preserve the body from 
destruction, so that it might remain to the end of time a home 
for the soul. Hence arose the practice of embalming. The future 
The embalmed body (mummy) was then placed Ufe 
in the grave, which the Egyptians called an "eternal dwelling." 
Later Egyptian thought represented the future as a place of 
rewards and punishments, where, as we have just learned, the 
soul underwent the ordeal of a last judgment. As a man lived 
in this life, so would be his lot in the next. The Babylonians 
supposed that after death the souls of all men, good and bad 
alike, passed a cheerless existence in a gloomy underworld. 
The early Hebrew idea of Sheol, "the land of darkness and the 
shadow of death," 1 was very similar. Such thoughts of the 
future life left nothing for either fear or hope. The Hebrews 
later came to believe in the resurrection of the dead and the last 
judgment, conceptions afterward taken over by Christianity. 

16. Literature and Art 

Religion inspired the largest part of Oriental literature. The 
Egyptian Book of the Dead was already venerable in 2000 B.C. 
It was a collection of hymns, prayers, and magical The Book of 
phrases to be recited by the soul on its journey be- the Dead 
yond the grave and in the spirit land. A chapter from this 
work usually covered the inner side of the mummy case, or 
coffin. 

Much more interesting are the two Babylonian epics, portions 

of which have been found on clay tablets in a royal library at 

Nineveh. The epic of the Creation tells how the god 

Marduk overcame a terrible dragon, the symbol of , ? a y ~ 

J Ionian epics 

primeval chaos, and thus established order in the 
universe. With half of the body of the dead dragon he made 
a covering for the heavens and set therein the stars. Next, 
he caused the new moon to shine and made it the ruler of the 
night. His last work was the creation of man, in order that the 
service and worship of the gods might be established forever. 
The second epic contains an account of a Deluge, sent by the gods 

1 Job, X, 21. 



56 



The Ancient Orient 




WSlijMMi 



The Deluge Tablet 

British Museum, London 

Contains the Babylonian Deluge narrative as pieced together 
and published by George Smith in 1872. There are sixteen 
fragments in the restoration. 



to punish sinful man. The rain fell for six days and nights and 
covered the entire earth. All people were drowned, except 

the Babylonian 
Noah, his family, 
and his relatives, 
who safely rode 
the waters in an 
ark. This an- 
cient narrative so 
closely resembles 
the Biblical story 
in Genesis that 
both must be 
traced to a com- 
mon source. 

The sacred 
books of the He- 
brews, which we 
call the Old Testament, include nearly every kind of litera- 
ture. Sober histories, beautiful stories, exquisite poems, wise 
The Old proverbs, and noble prophecies are found in this 
Testament collection. The influence of the Old Testament 
upon the Hebrews, and through them upon the Christian 
world for nineteen centuries, has been profound. We shall 
not be wrong in regarding this work as the most important 
single contribution made by any ancient people to modern 
civilization. 

The wealth and skill of the Egyptians were not lavished in the 
erection of fine private mansions or splendid public buildings. 
Egyptian The characteristic works of Egyptian architecture 
architecture are the tombs of the kings and the temples of the 
gods. Even the ruins of these structures leave upon the ob- 
server an impression of peculiar massiveness, solidity, and 
grandeur. Like the pyramids, they seem built for eternity. 

The architecture of the Tigris-Euphrates peoples differed 
entirely from that of the Egyptians, because brick, and not 
stone, formed the chief building material. In Babylonia the 



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Literature and Art 



57 



most characteristic structure was the temple. It was a solid, 

square tower, rising in stages (usually seven) to the top, where 

tlu- shrine of the deity stood. The different stages „ 

Babylonian 
were connected by a winding ascent. These tower- andAssyr- 

temples must have been very conspicuous objects on lanarchi- 

the plain of Shinar. Their presence there gave rise 

to the Hebrew story of the "Tower of Babel" (or Babylon). 

In Assyria the most characteristic structure was the palace. 

The sun-dried bricks, 

of which both temples pl^lf) 

and palaces were com- *§i| 

posed, lacked the dura- 



>] 



bility of stone and have |»>*^ ^2fL^$x& 
lone since dissolved 



VnV>£ Vi-ffjjp Y>W>? 
-full *A>>4YhV)<*> ■'- 



u i ' 









' • "^nvs p\*-> \vbfi «r 



&^-- 



since 
into shapeless mounds. 

The surviving ex- 
amples of Egyptian 
sculpture consist of 
bas-reliefs Oriental 
and figures sculpture 
in the round, carved 
from limestone and 
granite or cast in 
bronze. Though many 
of the statues appear 
to our eyes very stiff 
and ungraceful, others 
are wonderfully life- 
like. 1 Some Assyrian 
bas-reliefs also show a 
considerable develop- 
ment of the artistic sense, especially in the representation 
of animals. 2 

Painting did not reach the dignity of an independent art. 
It was employed solely for decorative purposes. Bas-reliefs 
and wall surfaces were often brightly colored. The artist had 

1 See the illustration on page 53. - See the illustration on page 38. 





Ancient Hebrew Manuscript 

Cambridge University Library, England 

A papyrus of the first century A.D., containing the Ten 
Commandments. It was discovered in Egypt. 



58 



The Ancient Orient 



no knowledge of perspective and drew all his figures in profile, 
without any distinction of light and shade. Indeed, Oriental 
Oriental painting, as well as Oriental sculpture, made small 
painting pretense to the beautiful. Beauty was born into 
the world with the art of the Greeks. 




An Assyrian Palace (Restored) 

The royal residence of Sargon II near Nineveh was placed upon a high platform of brick 
masonry, the top of which was gained by stairs and an inclined roadway. The palace con- 
sisted of a series of one-storied rectangular halls and long corridors surrounding inner courts. 
They were provided with imposing entrances, flanked by colossal human-headed bulls, repre- 
senting guardian spirits. The entire building covered more than twenty-three acres and 
contained two hundred apartments. In the rear is seen a tower-temple. 



17. Science 

Conspicuous advance took place in the exact sciences. A 
very old Egyptian manuscript contains arithmetical problems 
with fractions as well as whole numbers, and geometrical 

1=1 111111111=9 n=io nnni=i5 no = 20 

C=I00 |=I000' 7=10,000 

112 e c nnnim = 4434 



theorems for computing 
Mathe- the capacity of 
matics storehouses and 
the area of fields. A 
Babylonian table gives 
squares and cubes cor- 
rectly calculated from 1 
Egyptian and Babylonian Numeration to 60. The number 12 



T=K=ioT>-=ioo <Y>- (10x100) =1000 
Tm<T^^rT-<«TTTT= 4 434r 



Si ience 



59 



Astronomy 



was the basis of all reckonings. The division of the circle 
into degrees, minutes, and seconds (360 , 60', 60") is a device 
which illustrates tins duodecimal system. Weights and meas- 
ures were also highly developed among 
the Babylonians. 

The cloudless skies and still, warm 
nights of the great river valleys early 
led to astronomical research 
Before 4000 B.C. the Egyp 
trans had given up reckoning time by 
lunar months (the interval between two 
new moons) and had formed a solar 
calendar consisting of twelve thirty-day 
months, with five extra days at the end 
of the year. This calendar was taken 
over by the Romans, who added leap 
years, and from the Romans it has come 
down to us. The Babylonians made 
noteworthy progress in some branches 
of astronomy. They were able to trace 
the course of the sun through the twelve 
constellations of the zodiac, 1 to distin- 
guish five of the planets, and to predict 
eclipses of the sun and of the moon. 
We do not know what instruments were 
used by the Babylonians for their re- 
markable observations. 

The art of stone masonry arose in 
Egypt at the close of the fourth mil- 
lennium B.C. — earlier than 

. Engineering 

anywhere else in the world. 

It soon produced the Great Pyramid. 

the largest stone structure ever erected in ancient or (until 
recently) in modern times. The Egyptians were also the 
first people who learned how to raise buildings with vast halls 

1 At least seven of the zodiacal signs found in our almanacs — lion, ram, scorpion, 
crab, fishes, archer, and twins — are of Babylonian origin. 




A Babylonian Bound- 
ary Stoxe 

Stones recording the gift or 
sale of landed property were 
set up at the boundary of the 
land as a memorial of the 
transaction. One side of such 
a monument bore divine em- 
blems, among which arc the 
archer, the scorpion, and other 
signs later appearing in the 
zodiac. 



60 The Ancient Orient 

the roofs of which were supported by rows of columns (colon- 
nades). An upper story, or clerestory, containing windows, 
made it possible to light the interior of these halls. The 
column, the colonnade, and the clerestory, as architectural 
devices, were adopted by Greek and Roman builders, from whom 
they descended to medieval and modern Europe. To Baby- 
lonia Europe owes the round arch and vault, as a means of 
carrying a wall or roof over a void. In both Egypt and Baby- 
lonia the transportation of colossal stone monuments exhibits 
a knowledge of the lever, pulley, and inclined plane. 1 

The Oriental peoples made some progress in medicine. A 
medical treatise found in Egypt distinguishes various diseases 
and notes their symptoms. The curious characters 
by which apothecaries indicate grains and drams 
are of Egyptian origin. Even as early as the time of 
Hammurabi, there were physicians and surgeons in Babylonia. 
The healing art, however, was always much mixed up with 
magic, just as astronomy, the scientific study of the heavens, 
was confused with astrology. 

The schools, in both Egypt and Babylonia, were attached to 
the temples and were conducted by the priests. Reading and 
Schools and writing formed the chief subjects of study. It took 
libraries many years to master the cuneiform symbols or the 
even more difficult hieroglyphs. Having learned to read and 
write, the pupil was ready to enter upon the career of a scribe. 2 
When a man wished to send a letter, he had a scribe write it, 
signing it himself by affixing his seal. When he received a letter, 
he usually employed a scribe to read it to him. The scribes 
were also kept busy copying books on the papyrus paper or clay 
tablets which served as writing materials. Both the Egyptians 
and the Babylonians possessed libraries, usually as adjuncts to 
the temples and hence under priestly control. 

These schools and libraries were not freely open to the public. 

„ M . As a rule, only the well-to-do could secure any 

Education . J 

learning. The common people remained ignorant. 

Their ignorance involved their intellectual bondage to the past ; 

1 See the illustration on page 43. - See the illustration on page 42. 



Science 



61 




62 The Ancient Orient 

they were slow to abandon time-honored superstitions and 
reluctant to adopt new customs even when clearly better than 
the old. The absence of popular education, more than anything 
else, tended to make Oriental civilization unprogressive. 

18. Orient and Occident 

Our study of the ancient Orient has been confined chiefly to 
the Nile and Tigris-Euphrates valleys. The Egyptians and 
„ . . f the Babylonians originated civilization during the 
Oriental thousand years between 4000 and 3000 B.C., while 
civilization ^ ^ rest of the worW corit j nue( i either in Neo- 
lithic barbarism or Palaeolithic savagery. In Egypt and 
Babylonia men first developed out of the tribal state and began 
to form cities, states, kingdoms and empires ; here they first 
passed from hunting, fishing, and herding to the cultivation 
of the soil, manufacturing, and commerce; here first arose 
metallurgy, architecture, phonetic writing, mathematics, as- 
tronomy, medicine, and many other arts and sciences indis- 
pensable to the higher life of mankind. 

After 3000 B.C. civilization began to be diffused from its 
Egypto-Babylonian centers. Conquest, trade, and travel 
D . ff . f during the next twenty-five centuries led to increas- 
Oriental ing contact of peoples. By 500 B.C. the best of 
civilization what the Egyptians and Babylonians had done be- 
came the common possession of the Near East. 

From the Near East civilization was transmitted to the West. 
Four peoples, in particular, were agents in this process. Two of 
Transmis- them used the waterways between the Orient and the 
Oriental Occident. The Cretans, about whom we shall soon 
civilization study, for many centuries carried the products and 
practical arts of both Egypt and Babylonia to the islands of the 
iEgean and the Greek mainland, and even farther west to south- 
ern Italy, Sicily, and the coast of Spain. After about 1000 b.c 
came the Phoenicians ; their influence, as we have already 
seen, was felt in every country washed by the Mediterranean. 
The other two peoples made use of land routes. The Hittites, 
who spoke an Indo-European language, from early times spread 



Orient and Occidenl 



63 



over eastern Asia Minor and northern Syria. There they 
learned much from their Semitic neighbors and afterward 
communicated their learning to the Lydians oi" western Asia. 




Hittitk Warrior 

Bas-relief on a wall at Sinjerli, Asia Minor. The warrior carries a spear, shield, and long 
dagger or sword. His body and face are in profile, his shoulders in full view. He wears a 
short tunic, fringed at the bottom, and the conical hat of the Hittites. On his feet are shoes 

with turned-up toes. 

Minor, whose kingdom formed a fragment of the Hittile Empire. 
From the Lydians, in turn, various features of Oriental civiliza- 
tion passed over to the Greeks. 

Studies 

1. On an outline map of the Orient indicate eight important rivers, two gulfs, 
tlirie inland seas, the great plateaus and plains, the principal mountain ranges, two 
important passes, and all the cities mentioned in this chapter. 2. For what were 



64 The Ancient Orient 

the following places noted : Memphis, Thebes, Nineveh, Babylon, Susa, Sardis, 
Sidon, Tyre, and Jerusalem? 3. For what were the following persons' famous: 
Menes, Rameses II, Sargon, Hammurabi, Sennacherib, Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, and 
Darius? 4. Is the influence on civilization of such physical conditions as climate, 
fertility of soil, rainfall, mountain ranges, and rivers, greater or less to-da3' than in 
earlier times? 5. Why was Egypt called " the gift of the Nile? " 6. What modern 
countries are included within the limits of the Persian Empire under Darius? 
7. Define and illustrate these terms; tribe, city-state, kingdom, empire, and 
province. S. What was the origin of the " divine right of kings " ? 9. Explain 
what is meant by despotism, autocracy, and absolutism. 10. On the map be- 
tween pages 34-35 trace the principal Asiatic trade routes. 11. On the map 
facing page 46 locate the most important Phoenician water routes and settlements. 
12. Look up in the Old Testament (Ezskiel, xxxvii) an account of Phoenician 
commerce. 13. Compare the Negative Confession with the Ten Commandments. 
14. Define polytheism and monotheism, giving examples of each. 15. From what 
Oriental people do we get the oldest true arch? the first coined money? the 
earliest legal code? the most ancient book? 16. Why were the inventions and 
discoveries of the Egyptians and Babylonians of such great importance in the develop- 
ment of civilization? 17. Mention some of the defects and limitations of Oriental 
civilization as noted in this chapter. 



CHAPTER III 
GREECE » 

19. The Lands of the West 

History, which begins in the Near East, for the last twenty- 
five centuries has centered in Europe. Modern industry and 
commerce, modern systems of government, modern Europe in 
art, literature, and science are very much the h ist ° r y 
creation, during this long period, of European peoples. Within 
the last four hundred years, especially, they have occupied and 
populated America and Australia and have brought under their 
control all Asia, except China and Japan, nearly the whole of 
Africa, and the islands of all the seas. They have introduced 
into these remote regions their languages, laws, customs, and 
religion, until to-day the greater part of the world is subject to 
European influence. 

The geographical advantages enjoyed by Europe account, 
in part, for its historic importance. The sea, which washes 
only the remote edges of Asia, penetrates deeply Physical 
into Europe, forming numerous gulfs and bays. Eur °P e 
Europe has a longer coast-line than Africa and South America 
combined. No other continent possesses such opportunities 
for sea-borne traffic. Again, Europe is well supplied with 
rivers, which are navigable for long distances. Another feature 
of European geography is the preponderance of lowlands over 

1 Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter iii, "Early Greek Society as 
Pictured in the Homeric Poems"; chapter iv, "Stories from Greek Mythology"; 
chapter v, "Some Greek Tyrants"; chapter vi, "Spartan Education and Life"; 
chapter vii, "Xerxes and the Persian Invasion of Greece"; chapter viii, "Episodes 
from the Peloponnesian War"; chapter ix, "Alcibiades the Athenian"; chapter X, 
"The Expedition of the Ten Thousand"; chapter xi, "The Trial and Death of 
Socrates"; chapter xii, "Demosthenes and the Struggle against Philip"; chapter 
>:iii, " Exploits of Alexander the Great." 

65 



66 Greece 

highlands. Beginning in the west with southern England, the 
great European plain stretches across northern France, Belgium 
and Holland (the "Low Countries"), and northern Germany, 
and broadens eastward into Russia. About two-thirds of the 
continent are included in this plain. Furthermore, the moun- 
tains of Europe do not present such barriers to intercourse as 
those of Asia. The Alps, though very abrupt on the Italian 
side, slope gradually northward toward Germany. No other 
high mountains, except the Rockies, have so many easy passes 
or offer so little impediment to movement across them. More- 
over, the outspurs of the Alps in central and southeastern 
Europe are separated by transverse valleys, thus establishing 
convenient routes of communication from one region to another. 

Nearly all Europe lies in the northern half of the North 
Temperate Zone, that is, within those latitudes most conducive 
Climatic to the development of a high civilization. No- 

Europe where, except beyond the Arctic Circle, does exces- 

sive cold stunt body and mind, and nowhere does enervating 
heat sap human energies. The climate is moderated by the 
Gulf Stream drift, which reaches the British Isles and Scan- 
dinavia. Climatic conditions are made still more favorable 
by the circumstance that Europe lies open to the west, with 
great inland seas penetrating deeply from the Atlantic, and 
with the higher mountain ranges extending nearly east and 
west. The westerly winds, warmed in passing over the Gulf 
Stream drift, can thus spread far into the interior, bringing with 
them an abundant rainfall, except in such regions as southern 
Spain, Italy, Greece, and eastern Russia. Europe, in conse- 
quence, is the only continent without extensive deserts. 

We learned in the first chapter that Europe was inhabited by 
man during Palaeolithic times and that, with the exception of 
Racial types certain invading peoples who came from Asia in 
of Europe antiquity or the Middle Ages, the present inhabit- 
ants of Europe belong to the White Race. 1 They may be 
separated into three racial types. The Baltic or Nordic 
(northern) type is found in the Scandinavian countries and 

1 See page 13. 



The Lands of the West 



67 



throughout the great European plain : it is characterized by a 
long or narrow head, tall stature, very light hair, blue eyes, and 
blond complexion. The Mediterranean (southern) type pre- 
vails in the peninsulas of southern Europe and the adjoining 
islands: it is short in stature and brunette in complexion, but 
is also long-headed. The Alpine (central) type comes midway 
between the other two in respect to stature and complexion, 




Heavy-faced line! 8nflw districts where the race in.li.at.-.l is nf-iwfrT'st-t.xjit. 



Racial Types in Western EuRorE 



but has a broad head, unlike either of them. Each of these 
racial types, despite some fusion with the others, still occu- 
pies a fairly well-defined area of the continent. The Baltic 
type possibly originated in Europe where it is now found. The 
Mediterranean and Alpine types are believed to have entered 
Europe about the beginning of Neolithic times, the one from 
North Africa, the other from Asia. 

About sixty distinct languages are still spoken in Europe. 
Ancientlv, there were many more. The Turks in the Balkan 



68 Greece 

Peninsula and the Mongols and Tatars in Russia still keep 
their Asiatic tongues. The same is true of the Magyars (Hun- 
Languages garians), Esthonians, and Finns, who in other 
of Europe respects have been thoroughly Europeanized. The 
remaining languages of any importance belong to the Indo- 
European family. 1 

Racial and linguistic groupings do not necessarily coincide in 
Europe any more than in other parts of the world. The North 
Race and Frenchman Is more nearly allied in physical char- 

language acteristics to the North German than to the South 

in Europe Frenchman ; and the North Italian resembles the 
South German more closely than the South Italian or Sicilian. 
A study of the accompanying map will furnish other illustra- 
tions of the fact that race and language are not convertible 
terms. 

The almost unbroken mountain chain formed by the Pyrenees, 
the Alps, and the Balkans sharply separates the northern and 
European central land mass of Europe from the southern 
peoples p ar t f the continent. Twenty- five centuries ago 

Europe beyond these mountain barriers had not entered the 
light of history. Its Celtic, Teutonic, Lettic, and Slavic- 
speaking inhabitants were still barbarians. During ancient 
times we hear little of them, except as their occasional migra- 
tions southward brought them into contact with the civilized 
Graeco-Latin peoples along the Mediterranean. 

20. The Mediterranean Basin 

The Mediterranean, about 2200 miles in length and 500 to 600 
miles in greatest breadth, is the most extensive inland sea in the 
Character- world. It washes the shores of three continents — 
Mediterra- Europe, Asia, and Africa. Nevertheless, its basin 
nean basin i s relatively isolated, being confined within a 
mountain wall on the north and an almost impassable desert 
on the south. The climate of the basin falls half-way between 
tropical conditions and the temperate conditions of central 
and northern Europe. The sea exercises a moderating in- 
1 See the chart on page 18. 



The Mediterranean Basin 69 

fluence, however, raising the temperature in the rainy season 
(winter) and lowering h in the dry season (summer). The 
rainfall is, on the whole, scant}', with the result that the most 
important trees are the vine and the olive, which offer con- 
siderable resistance to drought. Their northern and southern 
limits, together with those of the orange, are shown on the map 
(p. 70). In respect to both climate and vegetation, the Med- 
iterranean basin is thus a region of marked individuality, a 
separate, definite area by itself. 

The Mediterranean was well suited for early commerce, 
because of its long and contracted shape, indented northern 
shore, and numerous islands. Mariners seldom a " highway 
had to proceed far from the sight of land or at a of nations " 
great distance from good harbors. Though its storms are 
often fierce, they are usually brief, since the narrow strait of 
Gibraltar shuts out the great waves of the Atlantic. Freedom 
from high tides also facilitates navigation. Such advantages 
made the Mediterranean from a remote period an avenue by 
which everything that the older Eastern world had to offer 
could be passed on to the younger West. And the various 
European peoples themselves were able to exchange their prod- 
ucts and communicate their ideas and customs along this 
"highway of nations." 

The Mediterranean basin divides into two parts. The 

boundary between them occurs near the center, where Africa 

and Sicily almost touch each other across a narrow • ni .. , 

Divisions of 

strait. The western part contains, besides Sicily, the Mediter- 
the large islands of Sardinia and Corsica. Between ranean asm 
these islands and the Italian coast lies the wide expanse of the 
Tyrrhenian Sea. The eastern part includes the Adriatic, Ionian, 
and ^Egean seas. It was the last of these which had most im- 
portance in Greek history. 

The /Egean forms an almost landlocked body of water. The 
Balkan 1'eninsula, narrowing toward the Mediterranean into 
the smaller peninsula of Greece, confines it on the The jEgean 
west. On the east it meets a boundary in Asia Sea 
Minor. The southern boundary consists of a chain of islands. 



7° 



Greece 



The only opening northward is found in the Dardanelles (the 
ancient Hellespont), the Sea of Marmora (the ancient Pro- 
pontis), and the Bosporus. 

The islands of the JEge&n are a continuation into the Medi- 
terranean of the mountain ranges of Europe and Asia. In size 
The JEgean they vary from tiny Delos, less than three miles in 
Islands length, to the long and narrow ridge of Crete. 

Hundreds of them are sprinkled throughout the ^Egean, making 
it possible to cross that body of water in almost any direction 




without losing sight of land. The islands consequently became 
"stepping stones" between Greece and Asia Minor. 

Greece proper — continental Greece — is a tiny country. 
Its greatest length is scarcely more than two hundred and fifty 
miles ; its greatest breadth is only one hundred and 
eighty miles. Mountain ridges, offshoots of the 
Balkans, break it up into numberless small valleys and glens, 
which seldom widen into plains. The coast-line is most irregu- 
lar — a constant succession of sharp promontories and curving 
bays. No place in Greece is more than fifty miles from a 



Greece 



The yEgeans 71 

mountain range or more than forty miles from some long arm 
of the Mediterranean. 

The western coast of Asia Minor resembles Greece in its deep 
indentations, variety of scenery, and mild climate. Western 
The river valleys and plains of this region, how- Asia 
ever, are larger, more numerous, and more fertile 
than those of the Greek mainland. 

.21. The jEgeans 

The first civilization to arise in Europe was the work of 
gifted JEgca.11 peoples. They belonged to the dark-skinned, 
short-statured, long-headed branch of 
the White Race. This Antiquity of 
Mediterranean racial Mgean civi- 
type, as has been noted, 

probably originated in North Africa j3&0s?*%^% 
and spread entirely around the \ s wM\ 

Mediterranean, where its descendants 
still live to-day. During Neolithic : tlT,-\ 'f0&!% 
times it was already occupying the ;- ; _ 
.Egean Islands, the coasts of Greece, 
and western Asia Minor. Here 
modern excavations x have revealed 
centers of civilized life almost as "Throne of Minos" 

Venerable as those of Egypt and Excavated by' Sir Arthur Evans 
-r, , 1 • A 1 , 1 in the palace at Gnossus, Crete. 

Babylonia. As early as 3000 B.C. the The material is gypsum . This in . 

/Egeans began to give Up Stone im- teresting object dates from about 

plements in favor of copper and I5 °° BC ' 
bronze. These two metals were doubtless introduced from 
the Near East. The Copper-Bronze Age lasted in the /Egean 
for about two thousand years. 

/Egean civilization first arose in Crete and developed most 
highly there. We can understand why. Crete is a Qri . f 
kind of half-way house between Europe and the JEgean 
Near East. It lies only a few days' sail from the civilization 

1 Especially at Gnossus in Crete, Mycena: and Tiryns in Greece, and Troy in 
Asia Minor. 




72 



Greece 




mouths of the Nile and the shores of western Asia. The island 
was consequently in a position early to receive and profit by all 
the culture of the Orient. From Crete, in turn, cultural in- 
fluences spread throughout the ^Egean. 

iEgean civilization shows several marked characteristics. 
The people lived in villages and cities, where the frowning 

fortress of the chief or king looked 

down on the humble 

istics of .dwellings of common 

^gean men. The monarch, 

civilization . . 

as in the Orient, was 

doubtless a thorough despot, whose 
subjects toiled to build the great 
palaces and tombs. If life was 
hard and cheerless for them, it 
must have been pleasant enough 
for court ladies and gentlemen, 
who occupied luxurious apartments, 
wore fine clothing and jewelry, and 
enjoyed such exhibitions as bull- 
fights and the contests of pugilists. 
Remarkable progress took place 
in some of the arts. ^Egean archi- 
tects raised imposing 
palaces of hewn and 
squared stone and arranged them for a life of comfort. The 
palace at Gnossus in Crete even had tile water-pipes, bath- 
rooms, and other conveniences which have hitherto been re- 
garded as of recent origin. Brilliant wall paintings — hunting 
scenes, landscapes, portraits of men and women — excite 
our admiration. The costumes of the women, with their 
flounced skirts, puffed sleeves, low-cut bodices, and gloved 
hands, were astonishingly modern in appearance. ^Egean 
artists made porcelain vases and decorated them with plant 
and animal forms. They carved ivory, engraved gems, and 
inlaid metals. It was doubtless from these ^Egeans that the 
later Greeks inherited their artistic genius. 



: A Cretan Girl 

Museum of Candia, Crete 

A fresco painting from the palace 
of Gnossus. The girl's face is so 
astonishingly modern in treatment 
that one can scarcely believe that 
the picture belongs to the sixteenth 
century B.C. 



Art 



The Greeks 73 

A form of recording 1 noughts had been secured. The explora- 
tions in Crete show that its inhabitants had passed from pic- 
ture writing to sound writing. The palace of 
Gnossus contained several thousand clay tablets, 
with inscriptions in a language as yet unread. 1 About seventy 
characters appear to have been in common use. They prob- 
ably denote syllables and indicate a decided advance over both 
Egyptian and Babylonian scripts. 

.Much commerce existed throughout the Mediterranean 

during ^Egean times. Products of Cretan art or imitations of 

them are found as far west as Italv, Sicilv, Sar- _ 

- ' • ' Commerce 

dinia, and Spain, and as far east as inland Asia 
Minor, Syria, and Babylonia. Crete also enjoyed close com- 
mercial relations with both Egypt and Cyprus. In those 
ancient days Crete was mistress of the seas, and the merchants 
of that island preceded the Phoenicians as carriers between 
the Near East and Europe. 2 

.Egean civilization did not penetrate deeply into Europe. 
The interior of Greece remained the home of barbarous tribes, 
who had not yet learned to build cities, to create DoW nfall of 
beautiful objects of art, or to traffic on the seas. ^Egean 
Between about 1500 and 1000 B.C. their destruc- CIVllzaion 
tive inroads brought about the downfall of /Egean civilization. 

22. The Greeks 

The invaders who plunged the /Egean region once more into 
barbarism were a tall, light-complexioned, fair-haired, blue- 
eyed people, probably of the Baltic (Nordic) racial The Greek 
type. Their speech was Greek, which belongs to P e °P le 
the Indo-European family of languages. They lived a nomadic 
life as hunters and herdsmen. When the grasslands became 
insufficient to support their sheep and cattle, these northerners 
began to move gradually southward into the Danube Valley 
and thence through the many passes of the Balkans into Greece. 
The iron weapons which they possessed doubtless gave them a 

1 See the illustration on pag< . - See page 17. 



74 



Greece 



great advantage in conflicts with the bronze-using natives of 
this region. Sometimes the invaders must have exterminated 
or enslaved the earlier inhabitants ; more often, perhaps, they 
settled peacefully in the sunny south. Conquerors and con- 
quered slowly intermingled, thus producing the one Greek 
people which is found at the dawn of history. 




The Greeks, as we shall now call them, did not stop at the 
southern limits of Greece. They also occupied Crete and the 
The other iEgean Islands, together with the western 

Greek coast of Asia Minor. Their settlements in Asia 

Minor came to be known as vEolia (or ^Eolis) , Ionia, 
and Doris, after the names of Greek tribes. The entire basin 
of the iEgean henceforth became the Greek world. 

Several hundred years elapsed between the end of ^Egean 
civilization and the beginning of historic times in the Greek 
world, about 750 B.C. This period is usually known as the 



The Greeks 



75 




Homeric Age, because various aspects of it are reflected in two 
epic poems called the Iliad and the Odyssey. The former gives 
the story of a Greek expedition led by Agamemnon, The Homeric 
king of Mycenae, against Troy ; the latter relates A s e 
the wanderings of the Greek hero Odysseus on his return from 
Troy. The two epics were probably composed in Ionia, and by 
the Greeks were attributed to a blind bard named Homer. 
Many modern scholars, however, re- 
gard them as the work of several 
generations of poets. 

The Iliad and the Odyssey show 
how rude was the culture of the 
Homeric Age, as com- Culture of 
pared with the splendid the Homeric 
JEgean civilization which ge 
it displaced. The Greeks at this time 
had not wholly abandoned the life of 
shepherds for that of farmers. Wealth 
still consisted chiefly of flocks and 
herds. Nearly every freeman, how- 
ever, owned a little plot of land on which he cultivated grain and 
cared for his orchard and vineyard. Though iron was now used 
for weapons and farm implements, bronze continued to be the 
commoner and cheaper metal. Commerce was little followed. 
People depended upon Phoenician merchants for articles of 
luxury which they could not produce themselves. A class of 
skilled workmen had not arisen. There were no architects who 
could raise magnificent palaces and no artists who could paint 
or carve with the skill of their ^Egean predecessors. The back- 
wardness of the Homeric Greeks is also indicated by their failure 
to develop a system of writing to replace the old Cretan script 
which had utterly perished. 

Social life was very simple. Princes tended flocks and 
built houses ; princesses carried water and washed clothes. 
Agamemnon, Odysseus, and other heroes were not Homeric 
ashamed to be their own butchers and cooks, society 
Coined money was unknown. Values were reckoned in oxen 



The Swastika 

A prehistoric! symbol widely 
diffused throughout both the Old 
World and the New. The example 
here shown is on the cover of a 
vase found at Troy. 



76 Greece 

or in lumps of gold and silver. Warfare was constant and cruel. 
Piracy, flourishing upon the unprotected seas, ranked as an 
honorable occupation. Murders were frequent. The murderer 
had to dread, not a public trial and punishment, but rather the 
private vengeance of the kinsmen of the victim. On the other 
hand, both the Iliad and the Odyssey contain many charming 
descriptions of family life. "There is nothing mightier or 
nobler," sings the poet, "than when man and wife are of one 
heart and mind in a house, a grief to their foes, to their friends 
great joy, but their own hearts know it best." x 

The Homeric Greeks and their successors worshiped various 
gods and goddesses, twelve of whom formed a select council. 
Ideas of It was supposed to meet on snow-crowned Olympus 

the gods m northern Thessaly. Many Olympian deities 

appear to have been simply personifications of natural phe- 
nomena. Zeus, "father of gods and men," as Homer calls him, 
was a heaven god, who gathered the clouds in storms and hurled 
the lightning bolt. His brother, Poseidon, ruled the sea. His 
wife, Hera, presided over the life of women and especially over 
the sacred rites of marriage. His son, Apollo, a god of light, 
who warded off darkness and evil, became the ideal of manly 
beauty and the patron of music, poetry, and the healing art. 
Athena, a goddess who sprang full-grown from the forehead of 
Zeus, embodied the ideal of wisdom and all womanly virtues. 
These and other divinities were really magnified men and women, 
with human passions and appetites, but with more than human 
power and endowed with immortality. Morally, they were no 
better than their worshipers. But Homer, who sometimes 
represents them as deceitful, dissolute, and cruel, could also 
say, "Verily the blessed gods love not evil deeds, but they 
reverence justice and the righteous acts of men." 2 

Greek ideas of the future life were dismal to an ex- 
Ideas of the treme. All men, it was thought, went down after 
future life death to Hades and passed there a shadowy, 
joyless existence. The Greek Hades thus closely resembled 
the Hebrew Sheol and the Babylonian underworld of the dead. 3 
1 Odyssey, vi, 182-185. 2 Ibid., xiv, 83-84. 3 See page 55. 



The Greeks 



77 



Oracles 



The Greeks believed that communications from the gods 
were received at certain places called oracles. The oldest of 
('.reck oracles was that of Zeus at Dodona in 
Epirus. Here the priests professed to read the 
divine will in the rustling leaves of an oak tree sacred to Zeus 
At Delphi in Phocis the god Apollo 
was supposed to speak through a 
prophetess. The words which she 
uttered when thus "possessed" were 
interpreted by the attendant priests 
and delivered to inquirers. The fame 
of the Delphic oracle spread through- 
out Greece and reached foreign lands. 
Every year great numbers of people 
visited Delphi. Statesmen wished 
to learn the fate of their political 
schemes ; ambassadors sent by kings 
and cities asked advice as to weighty 
matters of peace and war ; and colo- 
nists sought directions as to the best 
country in which to settle. The oracle 
endured for over a thousand years. 
It was still honored at the close of 
the fourth century a.d., when a 
Roman emperor, after the adoption 
of Christianity, silenced it forever. 

The Greeks brought with them from on the Esquiline Hill, Rome. The 
,1 • .1 -i . i p statue represents a young man, per- 

their northern home a great love of haps an athlete at the i ymp ian 
athletics. Their most ~. 

The 

famous athletic festivals Olympian 

were those in honor of games 

Zeus at Olympia in Elis. The Olym 

pian games took place every fourth year, in midsummer. 1 

A sacred truce was proclaimed for an entire month, so that 

the thousands of spectators from every part of the Greek 

1 The first recorded celebration of the games occurred in 776 B.C., and from this 
year all Greek dates were reckoned. 




The Discus Thrower 

Lancelotti Palace, Rome 

Marble copy of the bronze origi- 
nal by Myron, a sculptor of the 
fifth century b.c Found in 1781 



games, who is bending forward to 
hurl the discus. His body is thrown 
violently to the left with a twisting 
action that brings every muscle 
into play. 



7 8 Greece 

world might arrive and depart in safety. No one not of 
Greek blood and no one convicted of crime might be a 
competitor. The games occupied five days, beginning with 
contests in running. There was a short-distance dash through 
the length of the stadium, a quarter-mile race, and also a 
longer race, probably for two or three miles. Then followed a 
contest consisting of five events : the long jump, hurling the 
discus, throwing the javelin, running, and wrestling. Other 
contests included boxing, horse races, and chariot races. 

The Olympian games were religious in character, because the 
display of manly strength was thought to be a spectacle most 
Influence of pleasing to the gods. The winning athlete re- 
tne Olympian ceived only a wreath of wild olive at Olympia, but 
at home he enjoyed the gifts and veneration of his 
fellow citizens. The thousands of visitors to the festival gave 
it the character of a great fair, where merchants set up their 
shops and money changers their tables. Poets recited their 
lines before admiring audiences, and artists exhibited their 
masterpieces. Heralds read treaties recently framed between 
Greek cities, in order to have them widely known. Orators 
spoke on subjects of general interest. Until their abolition, 
along with the Delphic oracle, the Olympian games did much 
to preserve a sense of fellowship among Greek communities. 

The Greek language formed the strongest tie uniting the 
Greeks. Everywhere they used the same beautiful and ex- 
Bonds of pressive speech, which still lives in modified form 
union among on the lips of several million people in modern 
Greece. Greek literature likewise made for unity. 
The Iliad and the Odyssey were recited in every Greek village 
and city for centuries. They formed the principal text-book 
in the schools ; an Athenian philosopher well calls Homer the 
"educator" of Greece. Religion provided still another tie, 
for all Greeks worshiped the same Olympian gods, visited the 
oracles at Dodona and Delphi, and attended the Olympian 
games. A common language, literature, and religion were 
cultural bonds of union ; they did not lead to the political uni- 
fication of the Greek world. 



The Greek City-States 79 

23. The Greek City-States 

A Greek city grew up about a hill of refuge (acropolis), to 
which the people of the neighborhood resorted in time of danger. 
This mount would be crowned with a fortress 
and the temples of the gods. Not far away was 
the market-place, where the citizens conducted business, held 
meetings, and enjoyed social intercourse. The most beautiful 
buildings in the city were always the temples and other public 
structures. Private houses, for the most part, were insignifi- 
cant in appearance, often of only one story, and covered with a 
flat roof. Judged by modern standards, a Greek city was small. 
Athens, at the climax of its power, may have had a quarter of a 
million people ; 1 Thebes, Argos, and Corinth, the next largest 
places, probably had between 50,000 and 100,000 inhabitants ; 
Sparta probably had less than 50,000. These figures include 
all classes of the population — citizens, slaves, and resident 
foreigners. 

The city included not only the territory within its walls, but 
also the surrounding district, where many of the citizens lived. 
Being independent and self-governing, it is properly The 
called a city-state. Just as a modern state, it city-state 
could declare war, arrange treaties, and make alliances with 
its neighbors. 

The citizens were very closely associated. They believed 
themselves to be descended from a common ancestor and they 
shared a common worship of the patron god or The 
hero who had them under his protection. These citizens 
ties of supposed kinship and religion made citizenship a privi- 
lege which a person enjoyed only by birth and which he lost 
by removal to another city-state. Elsewhere he was only a 
foreigner lacking legal rights — a man without a country. 

The independent city-states which from early times arose in 
the Near East eventually combined into kingdoms and em- 
pires under one government. 2 The like never happened in the 

1 Living not only in Athens itself and its port of Piraeus, but also throughout 
Attica. 

2 See pages 32-34 and 62. 



80 Greece 

Greek world. Mountain ranges and deep inlets of the sea, by 
cutting up Greece proper into small, easily defended districts, 
Civic made it almost impossible for one city-state to 

patriotism conquer and hold in subjection neighboring com- 
munities for any length of time. Many city-states, moreover, 
were on islands or were scattered along remote coasts of the 
Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The result was that the 
Greeks never came together in one nation. Their city feeling, 
or civic patriotism, took the place of our love of country. 

Religious influences sometimes proved strong enough to 
produce loose federations of tribes or city-states known as 
Amphictyo- amphictyonies. The people living around a famous 
nies sanctuary would meet to observe their festivals in 

common and to guard the shrine of their divinity. One of these 
local unions arose on the little island of Delos, the reputed 
birthplace of Apollo. A still more noteworthy example was the 
Delphic Amphictyony. It included twelve tribes and cities 
of central Greece and Thessaly. They established a council 
which took the temple of Apollo at Delphi under its protection 
and superintended the athletic games held there in honor of 
the god. One of the regulations binding on the members reads : 
"We will not destroy any amphictyonic town; we will not cut 
off any amphictyonic town from running water." This solemn 
oath did not always prevent the members of the Delphic 
Amphictyony from fighting one another and their neighbors; 
nevertheless, the federation deserves mention as the earliest 
peace agency known to history. 

During the Homeric Age each city-state had a king, "the 

shepherd of the people." The king did not possess absolute 

. authority, as in the Orient; he was more or less 
Government J ' ' 

of the controlled by a council of nobles. They helped 

city-state n - m m judgment and sacrifice, followed him to 

war, and filled the principal offices. Both king and nobles were 
obliged to consult the common people on matters of great 
importance, such as making war or declaring peace. The 
citizens would then be summoned to meet in the market-place, 
where they shouted assent to the proposals laid before them 




HERMES AND DIONYSUS 

Museum of Olympia 

An original statue by the great sculptor, Praxiteles. It was found in 1877 at Olympia. 
Hermes is represented carrying the child Dionysus, whom Zeus had intrusted to his care. 
The symmetrical body of Hermes is faultlessly modeled; the poise of his head is full of dig- 
nity; his expression is refined and thoughtful. Manly strength and beauty have never been 
better embodied than in this work. 




"3 .a 



The Greek City-States 81 

or showed disapproval by silence. This public assembly had 
little importance in the Homeric Age, but later it became the 
center of Greek democracy. 

After the opening of historic times in Greece many city- 
states began to change their form of government. In some of 
them, for example, Thebes and Corinth, the nobles Political 
became strong enough to abolish the kingship * vej>pmen 
altogether. Monarchy, the rule of one, thus gave city-state 
way to aristocracy, the rule of the nobles. In Sparta and 
Argos the kings were not driven out, but their authority was 
much lessened. Some city-states came under the control of 
usurpers, whom the Greeks called "tyrants." A tyrant was a 
man who gained supreme power by force or guile and governed 
for his own benefit without regard to the laws. There were 
many such tyrannies during the seventh and sixth centuries 
B.C. Still other city-states, of which Athens formed the most 
conspicuous instance, went through an entire cycle of changes 
from kingship to aristocracy, thence to tyranny, and finally 
to democracy, or popular rule. 

The city-states most prominent in Greek history were Sparta 
and Athens. Sparta had been founded at a remote period by 
Greek invaders of southern Greece (the Pelopon- 
nesus). It conquered some of the neighboring 
communities and entered into alliance with others, so that by 
500 B.C. its power extended over the greater part of the Pelopon- 
nesus. The Spartans were obviously good soldiers, but they 
were little more. They had no industries of importance, cared 
nothing for commerce, and lived upon the produce of their 
farms, which were worked by serfs. The Spartans never 
created anything worth while in literature, art, or philosophy. 
When not fighting, they passed their time in military drill and 
warlike exercises. Even their government bore a martial 
stamp. It was a monarchy in form, but since there were always 
two kings reigning at once, neither could become very powerful. 
The real management of affairs lay in hands of five men, called 
ephors, who were elected every year by the citizens. The 
ephors accompanied the kings in war and directed their actions ; 



82 Greece 

guided the deliberations of the council of nobles and public 
assembly; superintended the education of children; and ex- 
ercised a paternal oversight of everybody's private life. No- 
where else in the Greek world was the welfare of the individual 
so thoroughly subordinated to the interests of the society of 
which he formed a unit. 

The city-state of Athens stood in marked contrast to Sparta. 
Athens, by 500 B.C., had rid itself of kings and tyrants, had 
overthrown the power of the nobles, and had 
created the first really democratic government in 
antiquity. Later sections will describe this Athenian democ- 
cracy and set forth, also, some of the contributions of the 
Athenian genius to the artistic and intellectual life of mankind. 

24. Colonial Expansion of Greece 

The Greeks, with the sea at their doors, naturally became 
sailors, traders, and colonizers. After the middle of the eighth 
Age of century B.C., the city-states began to plant nu- 

colonization merous settlements along the shores of the Medi- 
terranean and the Black Sea. The great age of colonization 
covered about two hundred and fifty years. 1 

Trade was one motive for colonization. The Greeks, like 
the Phoenicians, were able to realize large profits by exchanging 
Motives for their manufactured goods for the food and raw 
colonization materials of other countries. Land hunger was 
another motive. The poor soil of Greece could not support 
many inhabitants, and, as population increased, emigration 
offered the only means of relieving the pressure of numbers. A 
third motive was political and social unrest. The city-states 
at this period contained many men of adventurous disposition, 
who were ready to seek in foreign lands a refuge from the op- 
pression of nobles or tyrants. They hoped to find abroad more 
freedom than they had at home. 

A Greek colony was not simply a trading-post; it was a 
center of Greek life. The colonists continued to be Greeks in 

1 See the map facing page 46. 



Colonial Expansion of Greece 



83 



language, customs, and religion; they called themselves "men 
away from home." Mother city and daughter colony traded 
with each other and in time of danger helped each Nature of 
other. The sacred fire carried from the public colonization 
hearth of the old community to the new settlement formed a 
symbol of the close ties binding them together. 

The Greeks established many colonies along the coast of the 
northern ^Egean and on both sides of the passages leading into 
the Black Sea. Their most important settlement Co i onies in 
here was Byzantium, upon the site where Con- the north 
stantinople now stands. The colonies which and northeast 
fringed the Black Sea were centers for the supply of fish, wood, 







An Athenian Trireme 

Bas-relief found on the Acropolis of Athens. Dates from about 400 B.C. The part of the 
relief preserved shows the waist of the vessel, with the uppermost of the three banks of rowers. 
Only the oars of the two lower banks are seen. 



wool, grain, meats, and slaves. The large profits to be gained 
by trade made the Greeks willing to live in what was then a wild 
and inhospitable region. 

The Greeks could feel more at home in southern Italy, where 
the genial climate, clear air, and sparkling sea recalled their 
native land. They made so many settlements in Colonies 
this region that it came to be known as Great in the west 
Greece (Magna Graecia). One of these was Cumae, on the 
coast just north of the Bay of Naples. Emigrants from Cumae, 
in turn, built the city of Naples (Neapolis), which in Roman 
times formed a center of Greek culture and even to-day possesses 
a large Greek population. Other important colonies in southern 



84 Greece 

Italy included Taranto, 1 Reggio, 2 and Messina. 3 The most 
important colony in Sicily was Syracuse, established by Corinth. 
The Greeks were not able to expand over all Sicily, owing to the 
opposition of the Carthaginians, who had numerous possessions 
at its western extremity. 

The Greeks were also prevented by the Carthaginians from 
gaining much of a foothold in Corsica and Sardinia and on the 
Other Medi- coast °* Spain. The city of Marseilles (Massilia), 
terranean at the mouth of the Rhone, was the chief Greek 
colonies settlement in this part of the Mediterranean. Two 

colonies in the southeastern corner of the Mediterranean were 
Cyrene, west of Egypt, and Naucratis, in the Delta of the Nile. 
From now on many Greek travelers visited Egypt to see the 
wonders of that strange old country. Greek colonies were also 
established in Cyprus and along the southern coast of Asia 
Minor. 

Greek colonial expansion formed one*of the most significant 
movements in ancient history, because it spread Greek culture 
Results of over so many lands. To distinguish themselves 
colonization f rom the foreigners, or "barbarians," 4 about them, 
the Greeks began to give themselves the common name of 
Hellenes. Hellas, their country, came to include all the terri- 
tory possessed by Hellenic peoples. The life of the Greeks, 
henceforth, was confined no longer within the narrow limits 
of the iEgean. Wherever rose a Greek city, there was a scene 
of Greek history. 

25. The Persian Wars, 499-479 B.C. 

The creation of the Persian Empire 5 almost immediately 

reacted upon the Greek world. Cyrus the Great, the first 

, Persian conqueror, destroyed the kingdom of 
Conquests of n ' J ° 

Cyrus the Lydia, thus becoming overlord of the Greek cities 

Great in Asia Minor. His son, Cambyses, annexed 

Cyprus and after subduing Egypt proceeded to add Cyrene and 

other Greek colonies in Africa to the Persian dominions. The 

1 Ancient Tarentum. 2 Ancient Regium. 3 Ancient Messana. 

4 Greek barbaroi, "men of confused speech." 6 See page 38. 



The Persian Wars 



85 



entire coast of the eastern Mediterranean came in this way 
under the control of a single, powerful, and aggressive 
state. 1 

The accession of Darius the Great to the throne of Persia 
only increased the dangers that overshadowed the Greek world. 
Darius desired to secure his possessions on the conquests of 
northwest by extending them as far as the Danube Darius 
River, which would furnish an admirable frontier. Accordingly, 
he entered Europe with a large army and marched against the 
barbarous but warlike Scythians, 
then living on both sides of the lower 
Danube. This enterprise was ap- 
parently a great success. Even the 
Scythians learned to tremble at the 
name of Persia's king. After the 
return of Darius to Asia, his lieu- 
tenants conquered the Greek settle- 
ments on the northern shore of the 
Dardanelles and the Bosporus, to- 
gether with the wild tribes of Thrace 
and Macedonia. The Persian Em- 
pire now included a considerable 
part of the Balkan Peninsula as far 
as Greece. 




fastened under the chin. His under- 
garments are of chequer-oattern, with 
sleeves and trousers. Over these he 
wears a tunic, gathered in at the 
waist. 



A Scythian 

Bibliotheque Nationals Paris 

A painting on an Attic vase ot 
about 400 B.C. The barbarian wears 

Not long after the European ex- a tail cap with lappets which could be 

pedition of Darius, the Ionian cities 

of Asia Minor revolted ,-. „ T „„„„ 
lne Ionian 

against Persia. The Revolt. 
Ionians sought the help 4 " 493 BC 
of Sparta, the chief military state of Greece. The Spartans re- 
fused to take part in the war, but the Athenians, who realized the 
menace to Greece from the Persian advance, aided their Ionian 
kindred with both ships and soldiers. The allied forces cap- 
tured and destroyed Sardis, the old capital of Lydia, The rest 
of the Asiatic Greeks now joined the Ionians, and even Thrace 
threw off the Persian yoke. These successes were only tem- 
1 Sec the map between pages 34-35. 



86 



Greece 



porary. The revolting cities could not hold out. against the 
vast resources of Persia. One by one they fell again into the 
hands of the Great King. 

Quiet had no sooner been restored in Asia Minor than Darius 
made ready to reassert Persian supremacy in the Balkan Pen- 
First Persian insula and to punish Athens for her share in the 
expedition Ionian Revolt. Only the first part of this program 
was carried out. A large army, commanded by Mardonius, 




The Persian Invasions of Greece 



the son-in-law of the Persian monarch, soon reconquered Thrace 
and received the submission of Macedonia. Mardonius could 
not proceed farther, however, because the Persian fleet, on 
which his army depended for supplies, was wrecked off the 
promontory of Mount Athos. 



The Persian Wars 



87 



The partial failure of the first Persian expedition only aroused 
Darius to renewed exertions. Two years later another fleet, 
bearing perhaps twenty thousand soldiers, set out Second 
from Ionia to Greece. Datis and Artaphernes, the Persian 
Persian leaders, sailed straight across the iEgean and ezpe * lon 
landed on the plain of Marathon, twenty-six miles from Athens. 

The situation of the 
Athenians seemed desper- 
ate. They BatUeo{ 
had scarcely Marathon, 

ten thousand 490 BC ' 
men with whom to face 
an army at least twice 
as large and hitherto in- 
vincible. The Spartans 
promised support, but de- 
layed sending troops at the 
critical moment. Never- 
theless, the Athenians de- 
cided to take the offensive. 
Their able general, Milti- 
ades, believed that the 
Persians, however numer- 
ous, were no match for 
heavy-armed Greek 
soldiers. The issue of the 
battle of Marathon proved 
him right. The Athenians 
crossed the plain at the 
quickstep and in the face 
of a shower of arrows drove the Persians to their ships. Datis 
and Artaphernes then sailed for home, with their errand of 
vengeance unfulfilled. 

"Ten years after Marathon," says a Greek historian, "the 
'barbarians' returned with the vast armament which was to 
enslave Greece." l Darius was now dead, but his son Xerxes 

> Thucydides, i, 18. 




Persian Archers 

Louvre, Paris 
A frieze of enameled brick from the royal palace 
at Susa. It is a masterpiece of Persian art and 
shows the influence of both Assyrian and Greek 
design. Each archer carries a spear, in addition to 
the bow over the left shoulder and the quiver on 
the back. These soldiers probably served as palace 
guards, hence the fine robes worn by them. 



88 Greece 

had determined to complete his task. Great quantities of 
provisions were collected; the Dardanelles strait was bridged 
Third Persian with boats ; and the promontory of Mount Athos, 
expedition where a previous fleet had met shipwreck, was 
pierced with a canal. An army, estimated to exceed one 
hundred thousand men, was brought together from all parts 
of the Great King's realm. He evidently intended to crush 
the Greeks by sheer weight of numbers. 

Xerxes did not have to attack a united Greece. Some Greek 
states submitted without fighting, when Persian heralds came 
Disunion of to demand "earth and water," the customary sym- 
the Greeks hols of submission. Some other states remained 
neutral throughout the struggle. But Athens and Sparta, 
with their allies, remained joined for resistance to the end. 

Early in the year 480 B.C. the Persian host moved out of Sar- 
dis, crossed the Dardanelles, and advanced as far as the pass 
b tti f °^ Thermopylae, commanding the entrance into 

Thermopylae, central Greece.. This position, one of great natural 
480 B.C. strength, was held by a few thousand Greeks under 

the Spartan king, Leonidas. Xerxes for two days hurled his 
best troops against the defenders of Thermopylae, only to find 
that numbers did not avail in that narrow defile. There is no 
telling how long the handful of Greeks might have resisted, 
had not the Persians found a road over the mountain in the 
rear of the pass. Leonidas and his men were now attacked 
both in front and from behind. Xerxes at length won the pass 
— but only over the bodies of its heroic defenders. Years 
later a monument to their memory was raised on the field of 
battle. It bore the simple inscription: "Stranger, go tell the 
Spartans that we lie here in obedience to their commands." l 

The Persians now marched rapidly through central Greece to 
Athens, but found a deserted city. Upon the advice of Themis- 
Battle of tocles, ablest of the Athenian leaders, the non- 
Salamis, combatants had withdrawn to places of safety 
480 B.C. and the ent j re fighting force of Athens had gone 
on shipboard. The Greek fleet, which consisted chiefly of 

1 Herodotus, vii, 228. 



Athens 89 

Athenian vessels under the command of Themistocles, then 
took up a position in the strait separating the island of Salamis 
from Attica and awaited the enemy. The Persians at Salamis 
had many more ships than the Greeks, but Themistocles believed 
that in the narrow strait their numbers would be a disadvan- 
tage to them. Such turned out to be the case. The Persians 
fought well, but their vessels, crowded together, could not 
navigate properly and even wrecked one another by collision. 
After an all-day contest what remained of their fleet withdrew 
to Asia Minor. The Great King himself had no heart for any 
more fighting. However, he left Mardonius, with a large body 
of picked troops, to subjugate the Greeks on land. So the real 
crisis of the war was yet to come. 

Mardonius passed the winter quietly in Thessaly, preparing 
for the spring campaign. The Greeks, in their turn, made a 
final effort. A Spartan army, supported by the Battles of 
Athenians and other allies, met the enemy near M a cai a e and 
the little town of Plataea in Bceotia. The Greek 479 B.C. 
soldiers, with their long spears, huge shields, and heavy swords, 
were completely successful. At about the same time as this 
battle the remainder of the Persian fleet suffered a crushing 
defeat at Mycale, on the Ionian coast. These two engagements 
really ended the Persian wars. Never again did Persia make a 
serious effort to conquer Greece. 

The Persian wars were much more than a contest for su- 
premacy between two rival powers. They were a struggle 
between East and West ; between Oriental despot- victorious 
ism and Occidental democracy. Had Persia won, Greece 
the fresh, vigorous Western civilization then being developed 
by Athens and other Greek states would have been submerged, 
probably for ages, under the influx of Eastern ideas and customs. 
The Greek victory saved Europe for better things. It was a 
victory for human freedom. 

26. Athens, 479-431 B.C. 

Greek history, for half a century after the close of the Persian 
wars, centers about Athens. She was now the most populous 



90 Greece 

of Greek cities. She possessed an extensive commerce through- 
out the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Her citizens 
Ascendancy were energetic ; her government was a democracy. 
of Athens The Athenians also enjoyed the prestige which 
resulted from their successful resistance to Persia. Herodotus 
even calls them the saviors of Greece. "Next to the gods," he 
says, "they repulsed the invader." l 

In order to remove the danger of another Persian attack, 
the Athenians formed a defensive league with their Greek 
Athens and kindred in Asia Minor and on the ^Egean Islands, 
the Delian It included, ultimately, over two hundred city- 
League states. Some of the wealthier members agreed to 
provide ships and crews for the allied fleet. All the other 
members preferred to make their contributions in money, 
allowing Athens to build and equip the ships. Athenian offi- 
cials collected the revenues, which were placed for protection 
in the temple of Apollo on the island of Delos. 

The Delian League formed the most promising step which 
the Greeks had yet taken in the direction of federal government. 
Athenian It might have developed into a United States of 

imperialism Greece, had the Athenians shown more wisdom 
and justice in dealing with their allies. Unfortunately, the 
Athenians proceeded to use the naval force which had been 
formed by the contributions of the league as a means of bringing 
its members into dependence upon Athens. The Delian com- 
munities were compelled to accept governments like those of 
Athens, to endure the presence of Athenian garrisons in their 
midst, to furnish soldiers for Athenian armies, and to pay an 
annual tribute. Even the common treasury of the league 
was eventually transferred from Delos to Athens. What had 
started out as a voluntary association of free and independent 
states thus ended by becoming, to all intents and purposes, an 
Athenian Empire. 

The Athenians governed imperially, but they belonged to a 
democratic state. Democracy, the rule of the sovereign people, 
was unknown in the ancient Orient. 2 It formed a Greek con- 

1 Herodotus, vii, 139. 2 See page 40. 



Athens 91 

tribution, especially an Athenian contribution, to civilization. 
The Athenians had now learned how unjust could be the rule 
of a king, a tyrant, or a privileged aristocracy. Athenian 
They tried, instead, to afford every free citizen, democracy 
whether rich or poor, whether noble or commoner, an oppor- 
tunity to hold office, to serve in the law courts, and to partici- 
pate in legislation. 

The center of Athenian democracy was the popular assembly. 
All citizens who had reached twenty years of age were members. 
The number present at a meeting rarely exceeded The popular 
five thousand, however, because so many Athe- assembly 
nians lived outside the walls in the country districts of Attica. 




An Athenian Inscription 

A decree of the popular assembly, dating from about 450 B.C. 

The popular assembly met every eight or nine days on the 
slopes of a hill called the Pnyx. After listening to speeches, 
the people voted, usually by show of hands, on the measures 
laid before them. They settled in this way all questions of 
war and peace, sent out military and naval expeditions, sanc- 
tioned public expenditures, and exercised general control over 
the affairs of Athens and her dependencies. 

Democracy, then, reached its height in ancient Athens. 
The people ruled, and they ruled directly. Every citizen could 
take some active part in politics. Such a government worked 
well in the conduct of a small city-state. It proved to be less 



92 Greece 

successful in the management of an empire. The subject com- 
munities of the Delian League were unrepresented at Athens. 
Absence of They had no one to speak for them in the public 
a represents- assembly or before the law courts. Hence their 
ive sys em interests were always subordinated to those of the 
Athenians. We shall notice the same absence of a representa- 
tive system in ancient Rome, after that city had become mis- 
tress of the Mediterranean basin. 

But even in Athens, most democratic of all Greek city-states, 
democracy was really class rule. Not all the free men — 
to say nothing of the numerous slaves — were 
citizens. The law restricted citizenship to those 
free men who were the sons of an Athenian father (himself a 
citizen) and an Athenian mother. Consequently, the thou- 
sands of foreign merchants and artisans living in Athens 
could not take any part in its government. This jealous 
attitude toward foreigners contrasts with the liberal policy 
of modern countries, such as our own, in naturalizing immi- 
grants. 

Athens contained many artisans. Their daily tasks gave 
them scant opportunity to engage in the exciting game of 
Industrial politics. The average rate of wages was very low. 
Athens i n S pite of cheap food and modest requirements 

for clothing and shelter, it must have been difficult for the city 
workman to keep body and soul together. Outside of Athens 
lived the peasants, whose little farms produced the olives, 
grapes, and figs for which Attica was celebrated. There were 
also thousands of slaves in Athens, as in other city-states of 
Greece. Their number was so great and their labor so cheap 
that we may think of them as taking the place of modern 
machines. Slaves did most of the work on large estates owned 
by wealthy men, toiled in the mines and quarries, and served 
as oarsmen on ships. The system of slavery lowered the 
dignity of free labor and tended to prevent the rise of poorer 
citizens to positions of responsibility. In Greece, as in the 
Orient, 1 slavery cast a blight over industrial life. 

1 See page 43. 



Athenian Culture 93 

The Athenian city, during this period, formed the commercial 

center of Greece. Exports of wine and olive oil, pottery, 

metal wares, and objects of art were sent from Commercial 

Piraeus, the port of Athens, to every part of the Athens 

Greek world. The imports from the Black Sea region, Thrace. 

Asia Minor, Egypt, Sicily, and Italy included such commodities 

as salt, dried fish, wool, timber, hides, and, above all, great 

quantities of wheat. As is the case with modern England, 

Athens could feed all her people only by bringing in food from 

abroad. 

27. Athenian Culture 

The wealth which the Athenians found in industry and 
commerce, together with the tribute paid by the Delian League, 
enabled them to adorn their city with statues and Artistic 
buildings. The most beautiful monuments arose Atnens 
on the Acropolis. Access to this steep rock was gained through 
a superb entrance gate, or Propylaea, constructed to resemble 
the front of a temple with columns and pediment. Just beyond 
the Propylaea stood a huge bronze statue of the goddess Athena, 
by the sculptor Phidias. On the crest of the Acropolis were 
two temples. The smaller one, named after Erechtheus, a 
legendary Athenian king, was of the Ionic order of architecture. 
The larger one, dedicated to the Virgin Athena (Athena Par- 
thenos), was of the Doric order. It contained a gold and ivory 
statue (also by Phidias) of the goddess who had the Athenian 
city under her protection. A Greek temple, 1 such as the Par- 
thenon, was merely a rectangular building, provided with doors > 
but without windows, and surrounded by a single or a double 
row of columns. The temple did not serve as a meeting place 
for worshipers, but only as a sanctuary for the deity. Less 
imposing than the majestic structures raised in Egypt, it had 
more beauty, because of its harmonious proportions, perfect 
symmetry, and exquisite workmanship. The Parthenon is 
now a ruin. Many of the wonderful sculptures which once 
decorated the exterior have survived, however, and may be 
viewed to-day in the British Museum at London. 

1 Sec the plat'.- facing page 81. 



94 



Greece 



Up against a corner of the Acropolis, the Athenians built an 
open-air theater, where performances took place in midwinter 

and spring at the festivals of the god Dionysus. 

A Greek play would seem strange enough to us; 

there was no elaborate scenery, no raised stage, 
until late Roman times, and little lively action. The actors, 
who were all men, never numbered more than three or four. 
They wore elaborate costumes and grotesque masks. The 



The 

Athenian 

theater 




mgsm 



-.. . 






^!WJ 



fedS^C*^ 



SS^Si 



. . - ^^'<i«w ■ ^ ta >.^Vi»- ^w^SS-V*. 




Theater or Dionysus, Athens 

About sixteen thousand persons could be accommodated in this open-air theater. They 
sat at first on wooden benches; later, stone seats were placed against the adjacent hillside. 
The marble seats in the front row, next to the orchestra circle, were reserved for prominent 
Athenians. 



narrative was mainly carried on in song, by the chorus, which 
met with the actors in the dancing ring, or orchestra. The 
theater held an important part in the life of Athens and, indeed, 
of all Greek cities. It formed a partial substitute for our pulpit 
and press, for it dealt either with religious and moral themes or 
with leading personages and questions of the day. The trag- 
edies and comedies produced by Athenian playwrights origi- 
nated a new type of literature — the drama. 

The playwrights composed in verse, but there were also 
Athenians who learned to write in prose. The first great prose 



Athenian Culture 



95 



writer of Greece, or of any other country, was the "father of 
history," Herodotus. Though born in Asia Minor, he passed 
much of his life at Athens, mingling in its brilliant Athenian 
society and coming under the influences, literary prose 
and artistic, which that city afforded. Herodo- 
tus wrote about the Persian wars, but also wove into his narra- 




An Athenian School 

Royal Museum, Berlin 

A painting by Duris on a drinking-cup, or cylix. The picture is divided by the two handles. 
In the upper half, beginning at the left: a youth playing the double flute as a lesson to the 
boy before him; a teacher holding a tablet and stylus and correcting a composition; a slave 
(padagogus), who accompanied the children to and from school. In the lower half: a master 
teaching his pupil to play the lyre; a teacher holding a half-opened roll, listening to a recita- 
tion by the student before him; a bearded padagogus. The inner picture, badly damaged, 
represents a youth in a bath. 



tive accounts of the Egyptians, Babylonians, and other Oriental 
peoples. His work is one of our chief sources of information 
for ancient history. Greek prose was further developed by the 
orators, who flourished in democratic Athens. 



9 6 



Greece 



The Greeks really founded philosophy, which means an 
intelligent effort to probe the mysteries of existence and human 
Athenian nature. No one did more in this direction than 

philosophers the Athenian, Socrates. A true "lover of wisdom" 
and one of the greatest teachers of any age, Socrates kept no 
school; he never wrote anything; he taught only by conver- 
sation with any one willing to discuss moral or religious sub- 
jects. When an old man, Socrates was 
convicted of impiety and of corrupting 
the youth of Athens by his doctrines. 
He suffered death, in consequence, but 
his philosophy did not perish. It found 
an exponent in the Athenian Plato, 
whose writings, known as Dialogues, took 
the form of question and answer that 
Socrates had used. Plato's works were 
profound in thought and admirable in 
style. They have continued to influence 
philosophic speculation to our own day. 
What the Greeks, and especially the 
Athenians, originated in art, literature, 

Athens, the 0rat ° r y> and P h i loso P h y 

" school of still abides in the world. 
Hellas" Much of it is unexcelled; 

all of it is an inspiration. There is no 
exaggeration, consequently, in the proud 
words which the statesman, Pericles, ap- 
plied to Athens in the fifth century B.C. : 
"Our city is equally admirable in peace and in war. We are 
lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate 
the mind without loss of manliness. Wealth we employ, not for 
talk and ostentation, but when there is real use for it. To 
acknowledge poverty with us is no disgrace ; the true disgrace 
is in doing nothing to avoid it. An Athenian citizen does not 
neglect the state because he takes care of his own household; 
and even those of us who are engaged in business have a very 
fair idea of politics. We alone regard a man who shows no 




Pericles 

British Museum, London 

The bust is probably a 
good copy of a portrait statue 
set up during the lifetime of 
Pericles on the Athenian 
Acropolis. Inscribed with the 
name Pericles in letters of the 
3d or 2d century B.C. 



Decline of the Greek City-States 97 

interest in public affairs, not as a harmless, but as a useless, 
character. ... In short, Athens is the school of Hellas." l 

28. Decline of the Greek City-States, 431-338 B.C. 

The patriotic Greeks, during the Persian wars, had achieved 

a temporary union and had fought valiantly, successfully, in a 

common cause. When all danger from Persia was ,.. 

" Disunion 

removed, it became impossible to continue a work- of the 
ing system of federation. The old antagonisms Greeks 
between rival communities arose again in full vigor. The 
Greek people, whose unity of blood, language, religion, and 
customs should have welded them into one nation, continued 
to be divided into independent and often hostile city-states. 

The history of Greece, after the Persian wars, is therefore a 
record of almost ceaseless conflict. In 431 b.c. the fierce and 
exhausting Peloponnesian War broke out between Conflicts 
Athens and Sparta, with their allies and depend- between the 
encies. After ten years of fighting without a Greeks 
decisive result, both sides grew weary of the struggle and 
made peace. Athens, instead of husbanding her resources 
for another contest with Sparta, then tried to conquer Syra- 
cuse, the largest Greek city in Sicily. The failure of the Sicilian 
expedition so weakened Athens that Sparta felt encouraged to 
renew the Peloponnesian War, this time with the financial help 
of Persia, who was always ready to subsidize the Greeks in 
fighting one another. The Peloponnesian War ended in 404 
B.C. with the complete triumph of Sparta. That city played 
the imperial role for a few years, until her harsh military rule 
goaded Thebes into revolt. By defeating Sparta, Thebes be- 
came the chief power in Greece. Athens and Sparta, however, 
joined forces to make headway against Theban dominion, and 
this, too, went down bloodily on the field of battle. By the 
middle of the fourth century B.C. it had become evident that no 
single city-state was strong enough or wise enough to rule 
Greece. 

A new influence now began to be felt in the Greek world — 

1 Thucydidcs, ii, 39-41. 



98 Greece 

the influence of Macedonia. Its people were an offshoot of 
those northern invaders who had entered the Balkan Penin- 
sula before the dawn of history. They were 
Macedonia . 

thus Greek in both blood and language, but less 

civilized than their kinsmen of central and southern Greece. 
Macedonia, however, formed a territorial state under a single 
ruler, in contrast to the disunited city-states of the other Greeks. 

Philip II, one of the most remarkable men of antiquity, be- 
came king of Macedonia in 359 b.c. He was not a stranger 
Philip II, to Greece. Part of his boyhood had been passed 

359-336 B.C. as a hostage at Thebes, where he learned the art 
of war as the Greeks had perfected it, and also gained an insight 
into Greek politics. The distracted condition of Greece offered 
Philip an opportunity to secure for Macedonia the position of 
supremacy which neither Athens, Sparta, nor Thebes had held 
for long. He seized the opportunity. 

Philip created a permanent or standing army of professional 
soldiers and improved their methods of fighting. Hitherto, 
Philip's battles had been mainly between massed bodies of 

army infantry, forming a phalanx. Philip retained the 

phalanx, only he deepened it and gave to the rear men longer 
spears. The business of the phalanx was to keep the front of 
the opposing army engaged, while horsemen rode into the 
enemy's flanks. This reliance on masses of cavalry to win a 
victory was something new in warfare. Another novel feature 
consisted in the use on the battle-field of catapults, a kind of 
artillery able to throw darts and huge stones for three hundred 
yards into the enemy's ranks. All these different arms working 
together made a war machine which was the most formidable 
in the ancient world until the days of the Roman legion. 

Philip commanded a fine army ; he ruled with absolute 
sway a territory larger than any city-state ; and he himself 
Philip's possessed a genius for both war and diplomacy, 

conquests With such advantages the Macedonian king entered 
upon the subjugation of disunited Greece. His first important 
success was won in western Thrace. Here he founded the city 
of Philippi, and secured some rich gold mines, the income from 



Decline of the Greek City-States 



99 



which enabled him to keep his soldiers always under arms and 
to tit out a fleet. Philip next made Macedonia a maritime state 
by annexing the Greek cities on the peninsula of Chalcidice. 
He also appeared in Thessaly, occupied its principal fortresses, 




Growth of Macedonia 

and brought the frontier of Macedonia as far south as the pass 
of Thermopylae. 

Philip's conquests excited mixed feelings at Athens, Thebes, 
and Sparta. He had many influential friends in these cities, 
some paid agents, but others honest men who Demos- 
favored Macedonian headship as the only means thene s 
of uniting Greece. Those opposed to Philip found their fore- 
most representative in the famous Athenian orator, Demos- 



IOO 



Greece 



thenes. His patriotic imagination had been fired by the great 
deeds which free Greeks once accomplished against Persia. 
Athens he loved with passionate devotion, and Athens, he 
urged, should become the leader of Greece 
in a second war for independence. 

The stirring appeals of Demosthenes 
met little response, until Philip entered 
Battle of central Greece at the head 

Chaeronea of his army. Athens, 
Thebes, and some Pelo- 
ponnesian states then formed a defen- 
sive alliance against him. The decisive 
battle took place at Chaeronea, in Bceotia. 
On that fatal field the well drilled and 
seasoned troops of Macedonia, led by a 
master of the art of war, overcame the 
citizen-soldiers of Greece. The victory 
made Philip master of all the Greek 
states, except Sparta, which still pre- 
served her liberty. It was the victory 
of an absolute monarchy over free, self- 
governing commonwealths. The city- 
states had had their day. Never again did 
they become first-rate powers in history. 
Philip's restless energy now drove him 
forward to the next step in his ambi- 
After tious program. He deter- 

Chseronea mined to carry out the 
plans, long cherished by the Greeks, for 
the conquest of Asia Minor and perhaps 
even of Persia. A congress of the Greek 
states, which met at Corinth, voted to 
supply ships and soldiers for the under- 
taking and placed Philip in command of 
the Graeco-Macedonian army. But Philip did not lead it into 
Asia. Less than two years after Chaeronea he was struck down 
by an assassin, and the scepter passed to his son, Alexander. 




Demosthenes 

Vatican Museum, Rome 
A marble statue, probably 
a copy of the bronze original 
by the sculptor Polyeuctus. 
The work, when found, was 
considerably mutilated and 
has been restored in numerous 
parts. Both forearms and 
the hands holding the scroll 
are modern additions. It 
seems likely that the original 
Athenian statue showed De- 
mosthenes with tightly clasped 
hands, which, with his fur- 
rowed visage and contracted 
brows, were expressive of the 
orator's earnestness and con- 
centration of thought. 



Alexander the Great, and the Conquest of Persia 101 






i; 



A, 



I 




29. Alexander the Great, and the Conquest of Persia, 
336 323 B.C. 

Alexander became king of Macedonia when only twenty 
years old. He had his father's vigorous body, keen mind, 
and resolute will. His mother, a proud, ambitious The youth- 
woman, told him that the blood of Achilles ran in ful Alexander 
his veins, and bade him emulate the deeds of that Greek hero. 
We know that he learned the ^^^^w^ 



Iliad by heart and always 
carried a copy of it on his 
campaigns. The youthful 
Alexander developed into a 
splendid athlete, skillful in all 
the sports of his rough-riding 
companions and trained in 
every warlike exercise. But 
Alexander was also well edu- 
cated. He had Aristotle, the 
most learned man in Greece, 
as his tutor. The influence of 
that philosopher, in inspiring 
him with an admiration for 
Greek civilization, remained 
with him throughout life. 

The situation which Alexander faced on his accession might 
well have dismayed a less dauntless spirit. Philip had not 
lived long enough to unite firmly his dominions ; Alexander 
his unexpected death proved the signal for uprisings and the 
against Macedonia. The Thracian tribes revolted, ree s 
and the Greeks made ready to answer the call of Demosthenes 
to arms. But Alexander soon set his kingdom in order. After 
crushing the Thracians, he descended on Greece and besieged 
Thebes. The city was captured and destroyed ; its inhabit- 
ants were sold into slavery. The fate of Thebes induced the 
other states to submit without further resistance. 

With Greece pacified, Alexander could proceed to the inva- 



'■:% 






s. 



-^ 



fj*. 



%:;%,:■ 

Alexander the Great 

After a medallion found at Tarsus in 
Asia Minor. 



102 Greece 

sion of Persia. The Persian Empire had remained almost 
intact since the time of Darius the Great. It was a huge, 
Alexander loosely knit collection of many different peoples, 
and the whose sole bond of union consisted in their al- 

Persians legiance to the Great King. 1 Its resources in men 

and wealth were enormous. However imposing on the outside, 
events proved that it could offer no effective resistance to a 
Graeco-Macedonian army. With not more than fifty thousand 
soldiers, Alexander destroyed an empire before which for two 
centuries the Near East had bowed the knee. 

Alexander entered Asia Minor near the plain of Troy, visited 
this site made famous by his legendary ancestor, Achilles, 
B ... overthrew with little difficulty such troops as op- 

of Issus, posed him, and then marched southward, captur- 

ing the Greek cities on the way. Western Asia 
Minor was soon freed of Persian control. Meanwhile, Darius 
III, the king of Persia, had assembled a large army and had 
advanced to the narrow plain of Issus, between the Syrian 
mountains and the Mediterranean. In such cramped quarters 
superiority in numbers counted for nothing. Alexander per- 
ceived this, and struck with all his force. After a stubborn 
resistance the Persians gave way, turned, and fled. The battle 
now became a massacre, and only the approach of night stayed 
the swords of the victorious Macedonians. 

Alexander's next step was the siege of Tyre. This Phoenician 
city, the headquarters of Persia's naval power, lay on an island 
c half a mile from the shore. Alexander could only 

of Tyre, approach it by building a mole, or causeway, be- 

332 B.C. tween the shore and the island. Battering rams 

then breached the walls, the Macedonians poured in, and Tyre 
fell by storm. The great emporium of the Near East became 
a heap of ruins. 

From Tyre Alexander led his army through Palestine into 
Alexander Egypt. The Persian officials there offered little 
in Egypt resistance, and the Egyptians themselves welcomed 

Alexander as a deliverer. He entered Memphis in triumph 

1 See pages 3&-3Q. 



Alexander the Great, and the Conquest of Persia 103 

and then sailed down the Nile to its western mouth. Here he 
laid the foundations of Alexandria, to replace Tyre as a com- 
mercial metropolis. 

The time had now come to turn eastward. Following the 
ancient trade routes, Alexander reached the Euphrates, crossed 
this river and the Tigris, and on a broad plain not Battle 
far from the ruins of Nineveh ! found himself con- of Arbela, 
fronted by the Persian host. Darius held an ex- ' ' 

cellent position and hoped to crush his foe by sheer weight of 




The Alexander Mosaic 

Naples Museum 

This splendid mosaic, composed of pieces of colored glass, formed the pavement of a floor 
in a Roman house at Pompeii, Italy. It was probably a copy of an earlier Greek painting. 
Alexander (on horseback at the left) is shown leading the cavalry charge against Darius III 
at the battle of Issus. The Great King wears the characteristic Persian headdress, with 
cheek pieces fastening under the chin. The royal charioteer (behind the king) lashes his 
horses, in order that Darius may escape. Persian nobles, meanwhile, are desperately fighting 
about their lord. 

numbers. But nothing could stop the Macedonian onset ; 
once more Darius fled away; and once more the Persians, 
deserted by their king, sought safety in ignominious flight. 

The battle of Arbela decided the fate of the Persian Empire. 
Alexander had only to gather the fruits of victory. End f th 
Babylon surrendered to him without a struggle. Persian 
Susa, with its enormous treasure, fell into the m P ire 
conqueror's hands. Persepolis, the old Persian capital, was 

1 See page 37. 



104 Greece 

given up to fire and sword. Darius himself, as he retreated 
into the eastern mountains, was murdered by his own men. 

The Macedonians had now overrun all the Persian territories 
except distant Iran and India. These regions were peopled by 
Conquest warlike tribes of a very different stamp from the 

of Iran effeminate Persians. Alexander might well have 

been content to have left them undisturbed, but 
the man could never rest while there were still conquests to 
be made. Long marches and many battles were required 
to subdue the tribes about the Caspian and the inhabitants 
of the countries now known as Afghanistan and Russian Turk- 
estan. Crossing the lofty barrier of the Hindu Kush, Alexander 
next led his soldiers into the valley of the Indus and quickly 
added northwestern India 1 to the Macedonian possessions. He 
then pressed forward to the conquest of the Ganges Valley, but 
his troops refused to go farther. They had had their fill of war. 

Alexander was of too adventurous a disposition to return by 
the way he had come. He built a fleet on the Indus and had it 
The return accompany the army down the river to its mouth, 
to Babylon His admiral, Nearchus, was then sent with the 
fleet to explore the Indian Ocean and to discover, if possible, a 
sea route between India and the Near East. Alexander him- 
self led the army by a long and toilsome march, through desert 
wastes, to Babylon. That city now became the capital of his 
empire. 

But the reign of Alexander was nearly over. In 323 B.C., 
Death of while planning expeditions against the Arabs, 

Alexander, Carthage, and the Italian states, he suddenly 

000 o r* 

' * sickened and died. He was not quite thirty-three 

years of age. 

Alexander was one of the foremost, perhaps the first, of the 
great captains of antiquity. Had he been only this, his career 
Alexander would not bulk so large in history. The truth is, 
in history fa^ during an eleven years' reign this remarkable 

man stamped an enduring impress upon much of the ancient 
world. At his death the old Greece comes to its end. During 

1 See pages 20. and 38. 




EMPIRE OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT, 336-323 B. C. 

I Under Alexander ^] Allied States ^J Independent States 
Route of Alexander 




THE KINGDOMS OF ALEXANDER'S SUCCESSORS 

I 1 Kingdom of the | ] Kingdom of the l i Macedonian 

I ' Seleueids >■ — —"J I'tolcmies ' ' Kingdom 

Route '>f Noarchus 



The Hellenistic Age 105 

the next two hundred years we follow, not the development 
of a single people, but the gradual spread of Greek civilization 
in the Near East. We enter upon the Graeco-Oriental or Hellen- 
istic 1 Age. 

30. The Hellenistic Age 

The empire created by Alexander did not survive him. It 
broke up almost immediately into a number of Hellenistic 
kingdoms, including Macedonia, Syria, and Egypt. Hellenistic 
They were ruled by dynasties descended from kingdoms 
Alexander. 2 These three states remained independent, though 
with shifting boundaries, until the era 
of Roman expansion in the Near East. 

Alexander's conquests, and the sub- 
sequent establishment of Hellenistic 
kingdoms, resulted in the Heiienizing 
disappearance of the bar- the Orient 
riers which had so long separated Eu- 
rope and Asia. Henceforth the Near 
East lay open to Greek merchants and 
artisans, Greek architects and artists, 
Greek philosophers, scientists, and A Greek Came0 

t, ■■ . , ,i , , Museum, Vienna 

writers. Everywhere into that hus;e, n t . . 

•> o ' Cut in sardonyx. Represents 

inert, unprogressive Orient entered the Ptolemy Phiiadciphus, king of 
active and enterprising men of Hellas. Egypt ' and his wife Arsino " 
They brought their Hellenic culture with them and became 
the teachers of those whom they had called "barbarians." 

The Heiienizing of the Orient was begun by Alexander, who 
founded no less than seventy cities in Egypt, in western Asia, 
in central Asia, and even in India. Alexander's Hellenistic 
successors continued city-building on a still more cities 
extensive scale. Unlike the old Greek city-states, the Hel- 
lenistic cities did not enjoy independence. They formed a 
part of the kingdom in which they lay and paid tribute, or 

•The term "Hellenic" refers to purely Greek culture; the term "Hellenistic," 
to Greek culture as modified by contact with the Orient. 

2 The Antigonids (from Antigonus) in Macedonia, the Seleucids (from Seleucus) 
in Syria, and the Ptolemies (from Ptolemy) in Egypt. 




io6 



Greece 



taxes, to its ruler. In appearance, also, the new cities contrasted 
with those of Greece. They had broad streets, well paved and 
sometimes lighted at night, a good water supply, and baths, 
theaters, gymnasiums, and parks. Such splendid foundations 
formed the real backbone of Hellenism in the Near East. 
Their inhabitants, whether Greeks or "barbarians," spoke 




V 



Lighthouse of Alexandria (Restored) 

The island of Pharos, in the harbor of Alexandria, contained a lighthouse built about 
280. B.C. It rose in three diminishing stages, the first being square, the second octagonal, 
and the third round, to a height of nearly four hundred feet. On the apex stood a statue. The 
lighthouse was considered by the ancients one of the "Seven Wonders" of the world. It 
collapsed (as the result of repeated earthquakes) in 1326 a.d. The minarets of Moslem 
mosques and the spires of Christian churches are both derived from this famous structure. 

Greek, read Greek, and wrote in Greek. For the first time in 
history the largest part of the civilized world had a common 
language. 

Some Hellenistic cities were only garrison posts in the heart 
of remote provinces or along the frontier. Many more, such as 
Commercial Alexandria in Egypt, Seleucia in Babylonia, An- 
o^East 1186 tioch in Syria, and Rhodes on the island of that 
and West name, were thriving business centers, through 
which Asiatic products, even those of distant India and China, 



The Hellenistic Age 107 

reached Greece. Kings, nobles, and rich men now began to 
build palaces, to keep up large households with many servants, 
and to possess fine furniture, carpets, tapestries, gold and 
silver vessels, and beautiful works of art. The standard of 
living was thus raised by the introduction of luxuries to which 
the old Greeks had been strangers. 

Greece and the Orient exchanged ideas as well as commodities. 
What the Greeks had accomplished in art, litera- intellectual 
ture, philosophy, and science became familiar to relations 
the Egyptians, Babylonians, and other Oriental East and 
peoples. They, in turn, introduced the Greeks to West 
their achievements in the realm of thought. 

The fusion of East and West went on most thoroughly at 
Alexandria in Egypt. It was the foremost Hellenistic center, 
because of its unrivaled site for commerce with an dria 
Africa, Asia, and Europe. The inhabitants in- 
cluded not only Egyptians, Greeks, and Macedonians, but also 
Jews, Syrians, Babylonians, and other Orientals. The popula- 
tion increased rapidly, and by the time of Christ Alexandria 
ranked in size next to imperial Rome. 

The Macedonian rulers of Egypt made Alexandria their 
capital and did everything to adorn it with imposing public 
buildings and masterpieces of Greek art. Learn- Alexandrian 
ing flourished at Alexandria. The city possessed culture 
in the royal Museum, or Temple of the Muses, a genuine uni- 
versity, with lecture halls, botanical and zoological gardens, 
an astronomical observatory, and a great library. The collec- 
tion of books, in the form of papyrus or parchment (sheepskin) 
manuscripts, ' finally amounted to over five hundred thousand 
rolls, or almost everything that had been written in antiquity. 
The more important works were carefully edited by Alexan- 
drian scholars, thus supplying standard editions of the classics 
for other ancient libraries. The learned men at Alexandria 
also translated into Greek various productions of Oriental 
literature, including the Hebrew Old Testament. Science like- 
wise flourished in Alexandria, for the professors, who lived in 

1 Sec page 26. 



The Hellenistic Age 



109 



% c " ^F^Tqean 



the Museum at public expense, had the quiet and leisure so 
necessary for research. Much progress took place at this time 
in mathematics, astronomy, physics, geography, anatomy, 
medicine, and other branches of knowledge. The Greeks in 
their investigations 
must have been 
greatly helped by 
the scientific lore of 
old Egypt and Baby- 
lonia, which was 
now disclosed to the 
world at large. 
Graeco-Oriental sci- 
ence in turn passed 
over to the Romans, 
and later became 
known to the Mos- 
lem and Christian 
peoples of the Mid- 
dle Ages. 

During the period 
following Alexander 
the Greek city-states 
began to realize 




The /Etoliax and Achaean Leagues (about 
229 B.C.) 

that the freedom they prized so much could only be secured by 
a close union. They now formed the ^Etolian League in central 
Greece and the Achaean League in the Peloponnesus. The 
latter was the more important. Its business lay in the hands 



The eminent scientist Ptolemy, who lived at Alexandria about the middle of the second 
century a.d., summed up in his map of the world the geographical knowledge of the ancients. 
Ptolemy's inaccuracies are obvious: his Europe extends too far west; his Africa is too wide; 
and his Asia is vastly exaggerated at its eastern extremity. He knows practically nothing 
of the Baltic Sea, marking only a small island as Scandia or Scandinavia. His idea of the 
British [sles is also vague. Ptolemy shows some knowledge of central and southern Asia, 
but India is not represented as a peninsula, and a huge gulf, with China on its farther shore, 
is placed in the remote cast. The size of Ceylon is exaggerated. Notice that Ptolemy repre- 
sents the Nile as rising in two lakes and that he marks the Mountains of the Moon in their 
approximate location. Two famous voyages of discovery have been indicated on this map ; 
namely, that of the Carthaginian Hanno to the Gulf of Guinea (about 500 b.c) and that of 
the Greek Pythcas possibly as far as the Baltic (about 330 b.c). 



no Greece 

of an assembly or congress, where each city, whether large 
or small, had one vote. The assembly, meeting twice a year, 
The iEtolian cnose a general, or president, levied taxes, raised 
and Achaean armies, and conducted all foreign affairs. The 
eagues cities, in local matters, continued to enjoy their 

old independence. This organization shows that the Achaean 
League was more than a mere alliance of city-states. It 
formed the first genuine federation that the world had ever 
seen, and its example was repeatedly cited by the American 
statesman who helped frame our Constitution. But the at- 
tempt to unify Greece came too late. Sparta refused to enter 
the Achsean League, and Athens failed to join the iEtolian 
League. Without these two powerful states, neither associa- 
tion could achieve lasting success. 

The Greeks who emigrated in such numbers to Egypt and 
western Asia lost citizenship at Athens, Sparta, or Thebes and 
Cosmopoli- formed subjects of the Ptolemies or of the Seleu- 
tanism cids. They surrendered local attachments and 

prejudices, which had so long divided them, to be "cosmopoli- 
tans," or citizens of the world. They likewise lost old feelings 
of antagonism toward non-Greeks. Henceforth the distinction 
between Greek and Barbarian gradually faded away, and man- 
kind became ever more unified in sympathies and aspirations. 
This Grasco-Oriental world of city-states, federations, and 
kingdoms about the eastern Mediterranean was now to come 
in contact with the great power which had been arising in the 
western Mediterranean — Rome. 

Studies 

I. Compare the area of Europe with that of Brazil, of Canada, and of the United 
States (including Alaska). 2. "In many respects Europe may be considered the 
most favored among the continents." Explain this statement in detail. 3. Why 
was Europe better fitted than Asia to develop the highest civilization? Why not 
so well fitted as Asia to originate civilization? 4. "The history of the Mediter- 
ranean from the days of Phoenicia, Crete, and Greece to our own time is a history 
of western civilized mankind." Comment on this statement. 5. How is Greece 
in its physical aspects "the most European of European lands"? 6. Why did 
Crete become the "cradle of our European civilization"? 7. Locate on the map 
Mount Olympus, Dodona, Delphi, and Olympia. 8. Define the terms monarchy, 



The Hellenistic Age in 

aristocracy, tyranny, and democracy, as the Greeks used them. 9. What differ- 
ences existed between Phoenician and Greek colonization? 10. Why have Greek 
colonies been called "patches of Hellas"? 11. What reasons can be assigned for 
the Greek victory in the Persian wars? 12. If the Athenian Empire had rested 
on a representative basis, why would it have been more likely to endure? 13. Flow 
far can the expression ''government of the people, by the people, and for the people" 
be applied to the Athenian democracy? 14. Present some differences between 
Athenian democracy and American democracy. 15. Using materials in larger 
histories, write an essay (500 words) describing an imaginary walk on the Athenian 
Acropolis in the days of Pericles. 16. Describe the theater of Dionysus (illus- 
tration on page 94). 17. Why has the Peloponnesian War been called the "suicide 
of Greece"? 18. On an outline map indicate the routes of Alexander, marking 
his principal battle-fields. Insert, also, the voyage of Nearchus. 19. What 
likenesses can you discover between the political condition of the Graco-Oriental 
world after Alexander and the condition of modern Europe? 20. Show that the 
founding of Hellenistic cities formed a renewal of Greek colonial expansion. 
21. What resemblances are there between the Achaean League and American 
federal government? 22. "The seed-ground of European civilization is neither 
Greece nor the Orient, but a world joined of the two." Comment on this statement. 
23. Enumerate some of the principal contributions of the Greeks to civilization. 



CHAPTER IV 
ROME 1 

31. Italian Peoples 

The Italian Peninsula is long and narrow. It reaches nearly 

seven hundred miles from the Alps to the sea, but measures only 

. . about one hundred miles across, except in the Po 

Italy . 

Valley. The shape of Italy is determined by the 

course of the Apennines. Starting from the Alpine chain at 
the Gulf of Genoa, they cross the peninsula in an easterly direc- 
tion almost to the Adriatic. Then they turn sharply to the 
southeast and parallel the coast for a considerable distance. 
The plains of central Italy are all on the western slope of the 
mountains. In southern Italy the Apennines swerve to the 
southwest and penetrate the "toe" of the peninsula. 

Geographical conditions exerted the same profound influence 
on Italian history as on that of Greece. In the first place, 
Geograohv Italy is not cut up by a tangle of mountains into 
and Italian many small districts. It was therefore easier for 
history ^g Italians than for the Greeks to establish one 

large and united state. In the second place, Italy has com- 
paratively few good harbors, but possesses upland pastures 
and rich lowland plains. The Italian peoples consequently 
developed cattle raising and agriculture much earlier than 
commerce. And in the third place, the location of Italy, with 
its best harbors and most numerous islands on the western 
side, for a long time brought the peninsula into closer relations 
with the western islands and the coasts of Gaul, Spain, and 

1 Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter xiv. "Legends of Early Rome" ; 
chapter xv, " Hannibal arid the Great Punic War " chapter xvi, " Cato the Censor : 
a Roman of the Old School"; chapter xvii, "Cicero the Orator"; chapter xviii, 
"The Conquest of Gaul, related by Caesar" ; chapter xix, "The Makers of Imperial 
Rome: Character Sketches by Suetonius"; chapter xx, "Nero: a Roman Em- 
peror"; chapter xxi, " Roman Life as seen in Pliny's Letters"; chapter xxii, "A 
Satirist of Roman Society." 

112 



Italian Peoples 



117, 



North Africa than with the countries of the eastern Medi- 
terranean. If Greece faced the civilized East, Italy fronted 
the barbarous West. 

The earliest civilization in Italy was introduced there by 
Etruscans from the .Egean region. Perhaps as early as iooo B.C., 
they landed on the western side of the peninsula, 
pushed back the earlier inhabitants, and founded 
a strong power in the region called after them Etruria (modern 



Etruscans 



DISTRIBUTION 

OF THE 

EARLY INHABITANTS 

OF 

ITALY 




v? A 



Tuscany). The Etruscan dominions in time extended along 
the coast from the Bay of Naples to the Gulf of Genoa and in- 
land to the Po Valley as far as the Alps. The Etruscans are a 
mvsterious people. No one has been able to read their lan- 
guage. It is quite unlike any Indo-European tongue, though 



U4 Rome 

the words are written in an alphabet borrowed from Greek 
settlers in Italy. Many other cultural influences reached the 
Etruscans from abroad. Babylonia gave to them the prin- 
ciple of the round arch l and the practice of divination. 2 Etrus- 
can graves contain Egyptian seals marked with hieroglyphs 
and vases bearing Greek designs. The Etruscans were skillful 
workers in bronze, iron, and gold. They built cities with 
massive walls, arched gates, paved streets, and underground 
drains. A great part of Etruscan civilization was ultimately 
absorbed in that of Rome. 

The Etruscans were followed by the Greeks. Greek colonies 
began to be planted in southern Italy after the middle of the 
eighth century B.C. 3 A glance at the map 4 shows 
that these were all on or near the sea, from the 
Gulf of Taranto to Campania. North of the "heel" of Italy 
extends an almost harborless coast, where nothing tempted the 
Greeks to settle. North of Campania, again, they found the 
good harbors already occupied by the Etruscans. The Greeks, 
in consequence, never penetrated deeply into Italy. Room 
was left for the native Italians, under the leadership of Rome, 
to build up their own power in the peninsula. 

Barbarous peoples of the Mediterranean racial type occupied 
Italy, as well as Greece, during Neolithic times. After them 
came invaders apparently of the Baltic (Nordic) 
racial type, who spoke an Indo-European lan- 
guage closely related both to Greek and to the Celtic tongues 
of western Europe. They entered the Italian Peninsula through 
the numerous Alpine passes, probably not long after the Greeks 
had found a way into the Balkan Peninsula. 5 Wave after 
wave of these northerners flowed southward, until the greater 
part of Italy came into their possession. We must assume that 
the invaders, having overcome all armed opposition, mingled 
more or less with the earlier inhabitants of Italy. There is 
every reason to believe that the historic Italians, like the his- 
toric Greeks, were a mixed people. 

1 See page 60. 2 See page 53. 3 See page 83. 

4 See the map facing page 122. 5 See page 73. 



The Romans 115 

The Italians who settled in the central, eastern, and southern 

parts of the peninsula were highlanders. They 

formed manv tribes, including the Umbrians and The Umbri- 
_ . , Tr . ,10 • ^> ans and the 

the Samnites. With the Samnites Rome was one samnites 

day to fight a duel for the supremacy of Italy. 

The western Italians, or Latins, were lowlanders. They 
dwelt in Latium, originally only the "flat land" extending 
south of the Tiber River between the mountains 
and the sea. The Latin plain is about thirty by 
forty miles in size. Its soil, though not very productive, can 
nevertheless support a considerable population devoted to 
herding and farming. The Latins, as they increased in number, 
gave up tribal life and established little city-states, like those 
of Greece. The need of defense against their Etruscan neigh- 
bors across the Tiber and the Italian tribes in the near-by 
mountains bound them together. At a very early period they 
united in the Latin League. The chief city in this league was 
Rome. 

32. The Romans 

Rome began as a Latin settlement on the Palatine Mount. 
It was the central eminence in a group of low hills just south of 
the Tiber and about fourteen miles from its ancient Founding of 
mouth. Shallow water and an island made the river Rome 
easily fordable at this point for Latins and Etruscans and facili- 
tated intercourse between them. Villages also arose on the 
neighboring mounts, and these in time combined with the 
Palatine community. Rome thus became the City of the 
Seven Hills. 1 

Rome, from the start, owed much to a fortunate location. 
The city was easy to defend. It lay far enough from the sea 
to be safe from sudden raids by pirates, and it ^vantages 
possessed in the seven hills a natural fortress, of the site of 
The city was also well placed for commerce on the ome 
only navigable stream in Italy. Finally, Rome was almost in the 

1 The Romans believed that their city was founded in 75.5 B.C., from which year 
all Roman dates were reckoned. 



n6 Rome 

center of Italy, a position from which its warlike inhabitants 

could most easily advance to the conquest of the peninsula. 

We cannot trace in detail the development of early Rome. 

The accounts which have reached us are a tissue of legends, 

dealing with Romulus, the supposed founder of the 
Early Rome . - n . , . , . „ , , . TTT1 

city, and the six kings who followed him. What 

seems certain is that the Roman city-state very soon fell under 

the sway of the Etruscans, who governed it for perhaps two 

centuries or more. Etruscan tyranny at length provoked a 

successful uprising, and Rome became a republic (about 509 B.C.). 

While the legends contain little history they do tell us a good 
deal about the customs, beliefs, morals, and everyday life of 
The Roman the early Romans. The family, in a very real 
family sense, formed the unit of Roman society. Its 

most marked feature was the unlimited authority of the father. 
His wife had no legal rights : he could sell her into slavery or 
divorce her at will. Nevertheless, no ancient people honored 
women more highly than did the Romans. The wife was the 
mistress of the home, as the husband was its master. She was 
not confined, as was an Athenian wife, to a narrow round of 
duties within the house. Though her education did not pro- 
ceed far, we often find the Roman matron aiding her husband 
both in politics and in business. Women, as well as men, made 
Rome great among the nations. Over his sons and his un- 
married daughters the Roman father ruled as supreme as over 
his wife. He brought up his children to be sober, silent, modest 
in their bearing, and, above all, obedient. Their misdeeds 
he might punish with banishment, slavery, or even death. As 
head of the family, he could claim all their earnings ; every- 
thing they had was his. The father's great authority ceased 
only with his death. Then his sons, in turn, became lords over 
their families. 

The Romans, as well as the Greeks and other ancient peoples, 
were ancestor worshipers. The dead received daily offerings 
The family 0I I0 °d and wine and special veneration on those 
religion festival days when their spirits, it was supposed, 

came from the underworld to visit the living. The worship 



The Romans 



117 



of ancestors immensely strengthened the father's authority, 
for it made him the chief priest of the household. It also made 




SUOVETAURILIA 
Louvre, Paris 
The relief pictures the sacrifice of a bull, a ram, and a boar, offered to Mars to secure 
purification from sin. Note the sacred laurel trees, the two altars, and the officiating magis- 
trate, whose head is covered with the toga. He is sprinkling incense from a box held by an 
attendant. Another attendant carries a ewer with the libation. In the rear is the sacrificer 
with his ax. 

marriage a sacred duty, so that a man might have children to 
accord him and his forefathers all honors after death. This 
religion of the family endured with little change throughout 
Roman history, lingering in 
many households as a pious 
rite long after the triumph of 
Christianity over paganism. 
The Romans worshiped 
various gods connected with 
their lives as The state 
shepherds, farm- religion 
ers, traders, and warriors. 
The chief divinity was Jupi- 
ter, who ruled the heavens 
and sent rain and sunshine to nourish the crops. The war 
god Mars reflected the military side of Roman life. His 
sacred animal was the fierce wolf ; his symbols were spears and 
shields; his altar was the Campus Martius (Field of Mars) 




An Italian Plowman 
A bronze group from Arezzo, Italy. The 
peasant holds a pole. A front view of the yoke 
appears above. 



u8 



Rome 



outside the city walls, where the army assembled in battle 
array. March, the first month of the old Roman year, was 
named in his honor. Other important deities were Mercury, 
who protected traders, Ceres, a vegetation goddess (com- 
pare our English word "cereal"), and Vesta, who kept watch 
over the sacred fire ever blazing in the Forum, or market- 
place, of Rome. Still other divinities were borrowed from the 
Greeks, together with many Greek myths. This religion of 
the state did not promise rewards or punishments in a future 
world. It dealt with the present life. Just as the family was 
bound together by the tie of common worship, so all the citizens 
were united in common reverence for the gods who watched 
over and guided the state. 

Agriculture was the chief occupation of the early Romans. 
"When our forefathers," said an ancient writer, "would praise 
E d a worthy man, they praised him as a good farmer 

social condi- and a good landlord ; and they believed that praise 
tlon could go no further." 1 Cattle-breeding also must 

have been an important occupation, since prices were originally 

estimated in oxen and sheep. 
No great inequalities of wealth 
could exist in such a com- 
munity of peasants. Few citi- 
zens were very rich ; few were 
very poor. The members of 
each household made their own 
Early Roman Bar Money clothing from flax or wool, and 

A bar of copper having the value of an ox, £ asn ioned Out of WOOd and clay 
whose figure is stamped upon it. Dates from 

the fourth century B.C. The Romans subse- what Utensils Were needed for 

quently cast copper disks to serve as coins. tne j r s i m ple life. The long USe 

of copper for money indicates that gold and silver were rare 
among the early Romans, and that luxury was almost unknown. 
These Romans were a manly breed, abstemious in food and 
Moral condi- drink, iron-willed, vigorous, and strong. Deep down 
tions i n their hearts was the proud conviction that Rome 

should rule over her neighbors. For this they freely shed 

1 Cato, De agricultura, i. 




The Roman City-State 



no 



their blood ; for this they bore hardship, however severe, without 
complaint. Before everything else, they were dutiful citizens 
and true patriots. Such were the sturdy men who formed 
the backbone of the Roman state. Their character has set 
its mark on history for all time. 

33. The Roman City-State 

Early Rome formed a city-state with a threefold government, 

as in Homeric Greece. 1 The king had wide powers : he was 

commander-in-chief, supreme judge, and head of 

., , , . Government 

the state religion. A council of elders (Latin senes, 

"old men") made up the Senate, which assisted the king in 

government. The popular assembly, whenever summoned 

by the king, voted on important questions. 

After monarchy disappeared at Rome, two magistrates, 

named consuls, took the king's place in government. The 

consuls enjoved equal honor 

, • tt i 11 The consuls 

and authority. Unless both 

agreed, nothing could be done. They thus 

served as a check upon each other, as was 

the case with the two Spartan kings.' 2 

When grave danger threatened the state 
and unity of action seemed imperative, the 
Romans sometimes appointed 
a dictator. The consuls relin- 
quished their authority to him and the 
people put their property and lives entirely 
at his disposal. The dictator's term of 
office might not exceed six months, but 
during this time he had all the power form- 
erly wielded by the kings. 

The Roman city-state seems to have 
been divided, during the regal age, between an aristocracy and 
a commons. The nobles were called patricians 3 and the com- 
mon people, plebeians. 4 The patricians occupied a privileged 




Curule Chair and 
Fasces 

A consul sat on the 
curule chair. The fasces 
(axes in a bundle of rods) 
symbolized his power to 
flog and behead offenders. 



1 See page 8o. 

3 From the Latin palres, "fathers." 



2 Sec pape 8i. 

4 Latin plebs, "crov/d." 



1 20 Rome 

position, since they alone sat in the Senate and served as 
magistrates, judges, and priests. In fact, they controlled 
p . . society, and the plebeians found themselves ex- 

and eluded from much of the political, legal, and 

plebeians re ligi us life of Rome. 

The oppressive sway of the patricians resulted in great un- 
rest at Rome, and after the establishment of the republic the 

plebeians began to agitate for reforms. They soon 
The tribunes r „ ". f . . „ . L J . 

compelled the patricians to allow them to have 

officers of their own, called tribunes, as a means of protection. 

Any tribune could veto, that is, forbid, the act of a magistrate 

which seemed to bear harshly on a citizen. There were ten 

tribunes, elected annually by the plebeians. 

Next followed a struggle on the part of the plebeians for legal 
equality with the patricians. The Romans hitherto had had 
Th Tw l simply unwritten customs, which were interpreted 
Tables, 451- by patrician judges. The plebeians now de- 
450 B.C. manded that the customs be set down in writing — 

be made laws — so that every one might know them and secure 
justice in the courts. A commission was finally appointed to 
prepare a code. The laws were engraved on twelve bronze 
tablets and set up in the Forum of Rome. A few sentences 
from them have come down to us in rude, unpolished Latin. 
They mark the beginning of Rome's legal system. 

It would take too long to tell how the plebeians broke down 
the patrician monopoly of office holding. The result was that 
Plebeian eventually they became eligible to the consulships 

office holding anc [ other magistracies, to seats in the Senate, and 
even to the priesthoods. Henceforth all citizens, whether 
patricians or plebeians, enjoyed the same rights at Rome. 

The Roman city-state called itself a republic — res publico, 
— "a thing of the people." The citizens in their assemblies 
Republican made the laws, elected public officials, and decided 
Rome questions of war and peace. But Rome was less 

democratic than Athens. The citizens could not frame, criticize, 
or amend public measures ; they could only vote "yes " or " no " 
to proposals made to them by a magistrate. All this afforded 



Expansion of Rome over Italy 121 

a sharp contrast to the vigorous debating which went on in the 
Athenian popular assembly. 1 

The authority of the magistrates, including both consuls 
and tribunes, was much limited by the Senate. It contained 
about three hundred members, who held office for 
life. Vacancies in it were filled, as a rule, by 
persons who had previously held one of the higher magistracies. 
There sat in the Senate every man who, as statesman, general, 
or diplomatist, had served his country well. All weighty 
matters came before this august body. It conducted war, 
received ambassadors from foreign countries, made alliances, 
administered conquered territories, and, in short, formed the 
real governing body of the republic. The Senate proved not 
unworthy of its high position. During the centuries when 
Rome was winning dominion over Italy and throughout the 
Mediterranean basin, the Senate conducted public affairs with 
foresight, energy, and success. An admiring foreigner once 
called it "an assembly of kings." 

34. Expansion of Rome over Italy, 509(?)-234 B.C. 

The first centuries of the republic were filled with warfare 
against the Etruscans on the north and the Italian tribes of 
the Apennines. About 390 B.C. the republic came Rome 
near to destruction, as a result of an invasion of supreme in 
the Gauls. These barbarians, a Celtic-speaking atium 
people, poured through the Alpine passes, conquered the Etrus- 
can settlements in the Po Valley, and then fell upon the Romans. 
A Roman army was annihilated, and Rome itself, except the 
fortress on the Capitoline Mount, was captured and bufned. 
The Gauls, according to the story, were induced to return to 
northern Italy by the payment of a heavy ransom in gold. 
Though they made subsequent raids, they never again reached 
Rome, which soon rose from her ashes stronger than ever. 
Half a century after the Gallic invasion, she was able to subdue 
her former allies, the Latins, and to destroy their league. The 
Latin War, as it is called, ended in 338 B.C. By this time 

1 See page 91. 



122 Rome 

Rome ruled in Latium and southern Etruria and had begun 
to extend her sway over Campania. 

The expansion of the Romans southward over the fertile 
Campanian plain soon led to wars with the Samnites, who 
Rome su- coveted the same region. In numbers, courage, 
preme in an( j military skill the two peoples were well 

southern matched. Nearly half a century of hard fighting 

Ital y was required before Rome gained the upper hand. 

The close of the Samnite wars found her supreme in central 
Italy. A few years later she annexed the disunited Greek 
cities in southern Italy (Magna Grascia). 

Rome was now the undisputed mistress of Italy from the 
strait of Messina northward to the Arno (Arnus) River. Etrus- 
Italy under cans and Greeks, together with Latins, Samnites, 
Roman rule an( j other Italian peoples, acknowledged her sway. 
The central city of the peninsula thus became the center of a 
united Italy. It should be noticed, however, that as yet Rome 
ruled only the central and southern parts of what is the modern 
kingdom of Italy. The Gauls held the Po Valley, while most 
of Sicily and Sardinia was controlled by the Carthaginians. 

As Rome extended her rule in Italy, she bestowed upon the 
conquered peoples citizenship. It formed a great gift, for a 
Roman Roman citizen enjoyed many privileges. He 

citizens could hold and exchange property under the pro- 

tection of Roman law ; could contract a valid marriage which 
made his children themselves citizens ; and could vote in the 
popular assemblies at Rome and hold public office there. At 
the period we have reached, Italy contained about three hundred 
thousand such citizens, all of them feeling a common interest 
in the welfare of Rome. This extension of the citizenship to 
those who formerly had been enemies was something quite 
novel in history, and it was the great secret of Rome's success 
as a governing power. 

The Italian peoples who failed to receive citizenship at this 

time were not treated as complete subjects, but as 

"friends and allies" of the Romans. They lost 

the right of declaring war on one another, of making treaties, 



10 II ] 

l y s ', ""■'■ : 



ROM|: IN ITALY 

| | Roman Possessions. at the End of the 
^ a ™ Kingdom, 50U B. C. 

I 1 Additional Possessions at the Close of 

' the Latin War, S38 B. C. 

Additional Possessions at the Beginning 
of the First Punic War, 261 B. C. 
Names underlined ( Verona l denote Latin 
Colonies. 
jfi^ ... Principal Soman Roads. 

r?) ° , , , 




Expansion of Rome beyond [taly [23 

and of coining money. Rome otherwise allowed them to 
govern themselves, never calling on them for tribute and only 
requiring that they should furnish soldiers for the Roman army 
in time of war. These allies occupied a large part of the 
Italian Peninsula. 

The Romans established what were called Latin colonies in 
various parts of Italy. The colonies consisted usually of 
veteran soldiers or poor plebeians, who wanted 
farms of their own. Being offshoots of Rome, the 
Latin colonies naturally remained faithful to her interests. 

The colonies were united with one another and with Rome 
by an extensive system of roads. The first great road, known 
as the Appian Way, was carried as far as Capua 

,.,, -irir- • ir Roman roads 

during the period of the Samnite wars and after- 
ward to Brindisi (Brundusium) on the Adriatic, whence travelers 
embarked for Greece. Other trunk lines were soon built in 
Italy, and from them a network of smaller highways penetrated 
every part of the peninsula. Roman roads, like those of the 
Persians, 1 were intended to facilitate the rapid dispatch of troops, 
supplies, and official messages into every corner of Italy. 
Being free to the public, they also became avenues of trade and 
travel and so helped to bring the Italian peoples into close touch 
with Rome. 

Rome thus began in Italy the process of Romanization which 
she was to extend later to Sicily, Spain, Gaul, and Britain. 
She began to make, all Italians like herself in blood, Romaniza- 
language, religion, and customs. More and more tion of Ital y 
they came to regard themselves as one people — a civilized 
people who spoke Latin as contrasted with the barbarous, 
Celtic-speaking Gauls. 

36. Expansion of Rome beyond Italy. 264-133 B.C. 

Rome had scarcely finished the conquest of Italy before she 

became involved in a life-and-death struggle with the city of 

Carthage. 2 This Phoenician colony occupied an admirable site, 

for it bordered on rich farming land and had the largest harbor 

1 See page 2 Sic page 48. 



124 Rome 

of North Africa. The Carthaginians gradually extended their 
control over the adjacent coast, eastward as far as the Greek 
city of Cyrene 1 and westward to the Atlantic. 
Carthaginian settlements also lined the shores of 
Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, the Balearic Islands, and southern 
Spain. The western basin of the Mediterranean formed, to a 
large extent, a Carthaginian lake. 

The Phoenician founders of Carthage kept their own (Semitic) 
language, customs, and beliefs and did not mingle with the 
Carthaginian native African peoples. The Carthaginian govern- 
civiiization ment was in form republican, with two elective 
magistrates somewhat resembling Roman consuls. The real 
power lay*, however, with a group of merchant nobles, forming a 
council. It was a government by capitalists, who cared very 
little for the welfare of the poor freemen and slaves over whom 
they ruled. The wealth of Carthage enabled her to raise armies 
of mercenary soldiers and to build warships which in size, 
number, and equipment surpassed those of any other Mediter- 
ranean state. Mistress of a wide realm, strong both by land 
and sea, Carthage was now to prove herself Rome's most 
dangerous foe. 

The First Punic War 2 was a contest for Sicily. The Car- 
thaginians wished to extend their rule over all that island, which 
First Punic fr° m i ts situation seems to belong almost as much 
War, 264-242 to Africa as to Italy. But Rome, now supreme 
in the Italian Peninsula, also cast envious eyes on 
Sicily. She believed, too, that the conquest of Sicily by the 
Carthaginians would soon be followed by their invasion of 
southern Italy. The fear for her possessions, as well as the 
desire to obtain new ones, led Rome to fling down the gage 
of battle. The war lasted nearly twenty-four years. It was 
fought mainly on the sea. The Carthaginians at the start had 
things all their own way, but with characteristic energy the 
Romans built fleet after fleet and at length won a complete 
victory over the enemy- The treaty of peace ousted the Car- 

1 See page 84. 

2 "Punic" (Latin Punicus) is another form of the word "Phoenician." 



Expansion of Rome beyond Italy 



125 



1 baginians from Sicily. Thai island now became the first Roman 
province. 

The peace amounted to no more than an armed truce. The 
decisive conflict, which should determine whether Rome or 
Carthage was to rule the western Mediterranean, The interval 
had vet to come. Before it came, Rome strength- of preparation 
vnc(\ her military position by seizing Sardinia and Corsica, in 
spite of Carthaginian protests against this unwarranted action, 







ROJIE and CARTHAGE 

at the Beginning of the Second Funic Wat 

I I Roman Dominions and Allies in 21S B. C. 

i Carthaginian Dominions and Allies in 218'B. C. 
Acquired by Rome from Carthage between 2G4-218 B. C. 
♦ -Hannibal's Route from New Carthage to Cannae. Italy 
Scale of Miles 



Longitude 



V East fron 



enwich 



10 




and by conquering the Gauls in the Po Valley. The Roman 
power now extended over northern Italy to the foot of the Alps. 
Carthage, meanwhile, created a new empire in Spain, as far north 
as the Ebro River. Spain at this time was a rich, though un- 
developed, country. The produce of its silver mines filled the 
Carthaginian treasury, and its hardy tribes, the descendants of 
Neolithic Europeans, made excellent soldiers for the Carthaginian 
army. Carthage thus had both means and men for another 
Struggle with Rome. 



126 



Rome 



The war which now ensued has been sometimes called the 
Hannibalic War, because it centered about the personality 
of Hannibal the Carthaginian. As a commander, 
he ranks with Alexander the Great. The Mace- 
donian king conquered for the glory of conquest ; Hannibal, 
burning with patriotism, sought to destroy the power which had 
humbled his native land. He failed ; and his failure left Car- 
thage weaker than he found her. Few men have possessed a 
more dazzling genius than Hannibal, but his genius was not 
employed for the lasting good of humanity. 

The Romans planned to conduct the war in Spain and Africa, 
at a distance from their own shores. Hannibal's bold move- 
Second Punic ments took them by surprise. The young Cartha- 
War, 218- ginian general had determined to fight in Italy. 
Since Roman fleets now controlled the western 
Mediterranean, it was necessary for him to lead his army, with 
its supplies, equipment, horses, and war elephants, from Spain 

through the defiles of the Pyrenees, 
across the wide, deep Rhone, over 
the snow-covered passes of the 
Alps, and down their steeper south- 
ern slopes into the valley of the 
Po. He did all this and at length 
stood on Italian soil. For fifteen 
years thereafter he maintained 
himself in Italy, marching up and 
down the peninsula, almost at 
will, and inflicting severe defeats 
upon the Romans. His hopes 
were brightest after the battle of Cannae (216 B.C.), which 
resulted in the annihilation of an entire Roman army. But 
Hannibal had no siege engines to reduce the Latin colonies 
that studded Italy or to capture Rome itself. His little army 
dwindled away, year by year, and reinforcements sent from 
Spain were caught and destroyed by the Romans before they 
could effect a junction with his troops. Meanwhile, the bril- 
liant Roman commander, Publius Scipio, drove the Cartha- 




A Carthaginian or Roman 
Helmet 

British Museum, London 
Found on'the battle-field of Cannae. 



Expansion of Rome beyond Italy 127 

ginians out of Spain and invaded Africa. Hannibal was 
summoned home to face this new adversary. He came, and on 
1 he field of Zama met his first, and only defeat (202 B.C.). Scipio, 
the victor, received the proud surname Africaiuts. 

The treaty of peace following the battle of Zama required 
Carthage to cede Spain, surrender all but ten of her warships, 
and pay a heavy indemnity. She also agreed victorious 
not to wage war anywhere without the consent of Rome 
Rome, thus becoming, in effect, a vassal state. The long duel 
was now over. A great nation had overcome a great man. 
While our sympathies naturally go out to the heroic figure of 
Hannibal, it must be clear that Rome's victory in the Second 
Punic War was essential to the continuance of European civiliza- 
tion. The triumph of Carthage in the third century, like that 
of Persia in the fifth century, 1 would have resulted in the spread 
of Oriental ideas and customs throughout the western Mediter- 
ranean. From this fate Rome saved Europe. 

The last chapter of Carthaginian history remained to be 
written. Though Carthage was no longer a dangerous rival, 
Rome watched anxiously for half a century the Third p ni 
reviving commerce of the Punic city and at length War, 149 
determined to blot it out of existence. A Roman 146 BC ' 
army landed in Africa, and the Carthaginians were ordered to 
remove ten miles from the sea. It was a sentence of death to 
a people who lived almost entirely by overseas trade. In 
despair they took up arms again and for three years resisted 
the Romans. The city was finally captured, burned, and its 
site dedicated to the infernal gods. The Carthaginian terri- 
tories in North Africa henceforth became a Roman province. 

The two European countries, Sicily and Spain, which Rome 
had taken from Carthage presented very different problems 
to the conqueror. Sicily had long been accustomed Romaniza- 
to foreign masters. Its peace-loving inhabitants tion of Sicil y 
were as ready to accept Roman rule as, in the past, they had 
accepted the rule of the Greeks and Carthaginians. Every year 
the island became more and more a part of Italy and of Rome. 

1 See pagi 



128 Rome 

Spain, on the contrary, gave the Romans some hard fighting. 
The Spanish tribes loved liberty, and in their mountain fast- 
Romaniza- nesses kept up a brave struggle for independence, 
tion of Spain it wa s not until 133 B.C. that their resistance was 
finally broken. Rome continued in Spain the process of Roman- 
ization which she had begun in Italy and Sicily. Many farmers 
and traders went to Spain ; even Roman soldiers, quartered 
there for long periods, married Spanish wives, and, on retiring 
from active service, settled in the peninsula. Rome made her 
way by the sword ; but after the sword came Roman civilization. 

While Rome was subduing and Romanizing the western 
Mediterranean, she also began to extend her influence in the 
Rome and eastern Mediterranean. The kingdom of Mace- 
Macedonia donia was the first Hellenistic state to become 
subject to Rome. Thus disappeared a great power which 
Philip had founded and Alexander had led to the conquest of 
the world. 

Having overcome Macedonia, Rome proclaimed the "free- 
dom" of Greece. But this meant really subjection, as was 
Rome and proved a few years later when the Achaean League x 
Greece became involved in a struggle with the Italian re- 

public. The heavy hand of Roman vengeance descended on 
Corinth, the chief member of the league and at this time one of 
the most beautiful cities in the world. In 146 B.C., the same 
year in which the destruction of Carthage occurred, Corinth 
was sacked and burned to the ground. The Greeks were hence- 
forth subject to Rome. They remained under foreign sway 
until the nineteenth century of our era. 

Rome was also drawn into a conflict with the kingdom of 
Syria. 2 That Hellenistic power proved to be no more capable 
Rome and than Macedonia of checking the Roman arms. 
Syria The Seleucid king had to give up most of his terri- 

tories in. Asia Minor. The western part of the peninsula, 
together with the Greek cities on the coast, was erected in 
133 B.C. into the province of Asia. The same year that wit- 
nessed the complete establishment of Roman rule in Spain thus 
1 See page no. 2 See page 105. 



Rome the Mistress of the Mediterranean 129 

saw Rome gain her first possessions at the opposite end of the 
Mediterranean. 



36. Rome the Mistress of the Mediterranean Basin 

Rome's dealings with her new dependencies overseas did 
not follow the methods that proved so successful in Italy. 
The Italian peoples had received liberal treat- provincial ad- 
ment. Rome regarded them as allies and in many ministration 
instances conferred upon them Roman citizenship. But for 
non-Italians Rome adopted the same system of imperial rule 
that had been previously followed by Persia and by Athens. 1 
She treated the foreign peoples from Spain to Asia as subjects 
and made her conquered territories into provinces. Their 
inhabitants were obliged to pay tribute and accept the over- 
sight of Roman officials. 

The proper management of conquered territories is always 
a difficult problem for the best-intentioned state. It cannot 
be trulv said, however, that even Rome's inten- ^ ., , 

' _ Evils of pro- 

tions were praiseworthy. -There was little desire vintial admin- 
to rule for the good of the subject peoples. A lstratlon 
Roman governor exercised almost absolute sway over his 
province. Usually he looked upon it as a source of personal 
gain and did everything possible during his year of office to en- 
rich himself at the expense of the inhabitants. They could 
indeed complain of the governor's conduct to the Senate, which 
had appointed him, but their injuries stood little chance of 
being redressed by senatorial courts quite ignorant of pro- 
vincial affairs and notoriously open to bribery. To the extor- 
tions of the governors must be added that of the tax collectors, 
whose very name of "publican" 2 became a byword for greed 
and rapacity. 

A possible solution of the problem of provincial administra- 
tion might have been found, if the provincials had been allowed 
to send delegates to speak and act for them before the Senate 

1 See pages 30 and 00. 

2 In the New Testament "publicans and sinners" arc mentioned side by side. 

Uhew, i.\, io. 



13° 



Rome 



No repre- 
sentative 
system 



and the popular assemblies of Rome. But the representative 
system met no more favor with the Romans than with the 
Athenians. 1 Rome, like Athens, was a city-state 
suddenly called to the responsibilities of imperial 
rule. The machinery of her government had been 
devised for a small republican community, and it broke down 
when extended to distant lands and peoples. A single city 
could not administer, with justice and efficiency, all Italy 
and the Mediterranean basin. 

Successful foreign wars greatly enriched Rome. At the end 
of a campaign the soldiers received large gifts from their com- 
mander, besides the booty taken from the enemy. Profitable 
The state itself made money from the sale of en- conquests 
slaved prisoners and their property. When once peace had 

been declared, Roman 
governors and tax col- 
lectors followed in the 
wake of the armies and 
squeezed the provin- 
cials at every turn. 
The Romans, indeed, 
seem to have con- 
quered the world less 
for glory than for 
profit. 

So much wealth 
poured into Rome from every side that there could scarcely 
fail to be a sudden growth of luxurious tastes, as had been 
Growth of the case with the Greeks and Macedonians after 
luxury Alexander's conquests. 2 Newly rich Romans 

developed a relish for all sorts of reckless display. They built 
fine houses adorned with statues, costly paintings, and furnish- 
ings. They surrounded themselves with troops of slaves. At 
their banquets they spread embroidered carpets, purple cover- 
ings, and dishes of gilt plate. Pomp and splendor replaced the 
rude simplicity of earlier times. 

1 See page g2. a See page 108. 




A Slave's Collar 

A runaway slave, if recaptured, was sometimes com- 
pelled to wear a metal collar riveted about his neck. One 
of these collars, still preserved at Rome, bears the inscrip- 
tion: Servus sum dom(i)ni mei Scholastici v{iri) sp(ecla- 
bilis). Tene me ne fugiam de domo. — "lam the slave 
of my master, Scholasticus, a gentleman of importance. 
Hold me, lest I flee from home." 



Rome the Mistress of the Mediterranean 131 




If the rich were becoming richer, it seems that the poor 
were also becoming poorer. After Rome had conquered so 
much of the Mediterranean basin, her markets DisapDear . 
were flooded with the cheap wheat raised in the ance of the 
provinces, especially in those granaries, Sicily P easantf y 
and North Africa. The price of wheat fell so low that Roman 
peasants could not raise enough to support their families and 
pay their taxes. They had to sell 
out, often at a ruinous sacrifice, to 
capitalists, who turned many small 
farms into extensive sheep pastures, 
cattle ranches, vineyards, and olive 
orchards. These great estates were 
worked by gangs of slaves from Car- 
thage, Spain, Macedonia, Greece, and 
Asia Minor. Thus disappeared the 
free peasantry, which had always 
been the strength of the Roman state. 

The decline of agriculture and the 
ruin of the small farmer under the 
stress of foreign com- The exodus 
petition may be studied to the cities 
in modern England as well as in 
ancient Italy. Nowadays an English- 
man, under the same circumstances, 
will often emigrate to America or to 
Australia, where land is cheap and it 
is easy to make a living. But Roman 
peasants did not care to go abroad. 
They thronged, instead, to the cities, to Rome especially, where 
they labored for a small wage, fared plainly on wheat bread, and 
dwelt in huge lodging houses, three or four stories high. 

We know little about these poor people of Rome. They must 
have lived from hand to mouth. Since their votes controlled elec- 
tions in the popular assemblies, they were courted „ 

,. , \ ^ , , / , ,- The city mob 

by candidates for office and kept from grumbling 

by being fed and amused. Such propertyless citizens, too lazy 



Youth Reading a Papyri's 
Roll 
Relief on a sarcophagus 
The papyrus roll was sometimes 
very long. The entire Iliad or 
Odyssey might be contained in a 
single manuscript measuring one 
hundred and fifty feet in length. 
In the third century a.d. the un- 
wieldy roll began to give way to 
the tablet, composed of a number 
of leaves held together by a ring. 
About this time, also, the use of 
vellum, or parchment made of 
sheepskin, became common. 



132 Rome 

for steady work, too intelligent to starve, formed, with the riffraff 

of a great city, the elements of a dangerous mob. And the mob, 

henceforth, plays an ever larger part in the history of the 

times. 

The conquest by the Romans, first of Magna Grsecia and 

Sicily, then of Greece itself and the Hellenistic East, familiarized 

r>.«i, •« them with Greek culture. Roman soldiers and 
vireek in- 
fluence at traders carried back to Italy an acquaintance with 

ome Greek customs. Thousands of cultivated Greeks, 

some slaves and others freemen, settled in Rome as actors, 
physicians, artists, and writers. Here they introduced the 
language, religion, literature, and art of their native land. 
Roman nobles of the better type began to take an interest in 
other things than farming, commerce, or war. They imitated 
Greek fashions in dress and manners, collected Greek books, 
and filled their homes with the productions of Greek art. Hence- 
forth every aspect of Roman society felt the quickening in- 
fluence of the older, richer culture of the Greek world. It was 
a Roman poet who wrote, — " Captive Greece captured her 
conqueror rude." 1 

37. Decline of the Roman City-State, 133-31 B.C. 

The period from 133 to 31 B.C. witnessed the breakdown 
of republican institutions and ended with the setting-up of 
A century of autocracy at Rome. The Roman city-state, 
revolution formerly a free, self-governing commonwealth, be- 
came transformed into an empire. There were two principal 
causes of the transformation. The first cause was political strife 
between Roman citizens. The class struggles of this period 
offered every opportunity for unscrupulous leaders to mount 
to power, now with the support of the Senate and the nobles, 
now with that of the populace. The second cause was foreign 
warfare, which enabled ambitious generals, supported by their 
soldiery, to become supreme in the government. Rome, after 
conquering the nations, found that she must herself submit to 
the rule of one man. 

1 Horace, Epistles, ii, 1, 156. 



Decline of the Roman City-State 133 

The century of revolution began with Tiberius Gracchus, 
who belonged to a noble Roman family distinguished for its 
services to the republic. He started out as a Tiberius 
moderate social reformer. Having been elected Gracchus, 
one of the ten tribunes 1 of the people, he brought 
forward in 133 B.C. a measure intended to revive the drooping 
agriculture of Italy. Tiberius proposed that the public lands 
of Rome, then largely occupied by wealthy men, who alone 
had the capital to work them with cattle and slaves, should 
be reclaimed by the state, divided into small tracts, and given 
to the poorer citizens. This proposal aroused a hornet's nest 
about the reformer's ears. Rich people had occupied the public 
lands so long that they had come to look upon them as really 
their own. So the great land owners in the Senate got another 
tribune, devoted to their interests, to place his veto on the 
measure. The impatient Tiberius now took a false step. 
Though a magistrate could not legally be removed from office, 
Tiberius had the offending tribune deposed and thus secured 
the desired legislation. His arbitrary conduct further incensed 
the aristocrats, who threatened to impeach him as soon as his 
term expired. To avoid impeachment Tiberius sought re- 
election to the tribunate for the following year. This, again, 
was contrary to the constitution, which did not permit any one 
to hold office for two successive terms. On the day appointed 
for the election, while voting was in progress, a crowd of senators 
burst into the Forum and killed Tiberius, together with three 
hundred of his followers. Both sides had now begun to dis- 
regard the law. Force and bloodshed, henceforth, were to 
decide political disputes. 

Nine years after the death of Tiberius Gracchus, his brother 
Gaius became a tribune. One of Gaius's first measures per- 
mitted the sale of grain from public storehouses to Gaius 
Roman citizens at about half the market price. Gracchus, 
The law made Gaius popular with the poorer classes, 123 " 121 BC - 
but it was very unwise. Indiscriminate charity of this sort in- 
creased, rather than lessened, the number of paupers. Gaius 

1 See rvage 129. 



134 Rome 

showed much more statesmanship in his other measures. He 
encouraged the emigration of landless men from Italy to the 
provinces and introduced reforms in provincial administration. 
He even proposed to bestow the right of voting in the assemblies 
at Rome upon the inhabitants of the Latin colonies. 1 This 
effort to extend Roman citizenship cost Gaius his popularity. 
It aroused the jealousy of the city mob, which believed that the 
enrollment of new citizens would mean the loss of its privileges. 
There would not be so many free shows and so much cheap 
grain. The people therefore rejected the measure. They 
even failed to reelect Gaius to the tribunate, though a law had 
been recently passed permitting a man to hold the position of 
tribune year after year. When Gaius was no longer protected 
by the sanctity of the tribune's office, he fell an easy victim to 
senatorial hatred. Another bloody tumult broke out, in which 
Gaius and several thousand of his followers perished. 

Civil strife at Rome had so far left the aristocrats at the head 
of affairs. They still controlled the Senate, and the Senate still 
The senato- governed Rome. But that body had degenerated, 
rial aristoc- The senators were no longer such able and patriotic 
racy men as those who had piloted the state while Rome 

was gaining world dominion. 2 They now thought less of the 
republic than of their own interests. Hence, as we have just 
seen, they blocked every effort of the Gracchi to improve the 
condition of the poorer citizens in Italy or of the provincials out- 
side of Italy. Their growing incompetence and corruption, 
both at home and abroad, made the people more anxious than 
ever for a leader against the senatorial aristocracy. 

The popular leader who appeared before long was not another 

tribune but a general named Marius. He gained his greatest 

. distinction in a war with some of the Teutonic 

peoples. These barbarians, whom we now hear of 

for the first time, had begun their migrations southward toward 

the Mediterranean basin. Rome was henceforth to face them in 

every century of her national existence. The decisive victories 

which Marius gained over them in southern Gaul and northern 

1 See page 123. 2 See page 121. 



Decline of the Roman Citv-State 



135 



Sulla 



Italy removed a grave danger threatening Rome. The time 

had not come for ancient civilization to be submerged under a 
wave of barbarism. 

Meanwhile, the senatorial aristocracy also found a leader in 
the brilliant noble Sulla. He, too, rose to eminence as a suc- 
cessful general, this 
time in a war between 
Rome and the Italian allies. It 
resulted from the refusal of the 
Senate and popular assemblies to 
extend Roman citizenship through- 
out Italy. The war ended only 
when Rome granted the desired 
citizenship, thus returning to her 
policy in former times. 1 The in- 
habitants of nearly all the Italian 
towns were soon enrolled as citi- 
zens at Rome, though they could 
not vote or stand for office unless 
they visited in person the capital 
city. In practice, therefore, the 
populace of Rome still had the con- 
trolling voice in ordinary legisla- 
tion. 

Marius and Sulla were rivals not 
only in war but also in politics. 
The one was the champion of the democrats, the other, of 
the aristocrats. The rivalry between them finally led to 
civil war, with its attendant bloodshed. Sulla Rival of 
triumphed, thus becoming supreme in the state. Marius and 
Rome now came under the rule of one man, for a 
the first lime since the expulsion of the kings. Sulla used his 
position of "Perpetual Dictator" only to pass a series of laws 
intended to intrench the Senate in power. He then retired 
to private life and died soon afterward (78 B.C.). 

After Sulla's death his friend Pompey was the leading figure 
1 See page 122. 




A Roman Legionary 

From a monument of the imperial 
age. The soldier wears a metal helmet, 
a leather doublet with shoulder-pieces, 
a metal-plated belt, and a sword hang- 
ing from a strap thrown over the left 
shoulder. His left hand holds a large 
shield, his right, a heavy javelin. 



136 



Rome 



in Roman politics. Pompey won great fame as a commander. 

He crushed a rebellion of the Spaniards, put down a formidable 
insurrection in Italy of slaves, outlaws, and ruined 
peasants, ridded the Mediterranean of pirates, and 

won sweeping conquests in the East, where he annexed Syria 

and Palestine to the Roman dominions. 



Pompey 




Julius Caesar 



A Testudo 
A relief from the Column of Trajan, Rome. The name testudo, a tortoise (shell), was ap- 
plied to the covering made by a body of soldiers who placed their shields over their heads. 
The shields fitted so closely together that men could walk on them and even horses and 
chariots could be driven over them. 

Rome at this time contained another able man in the person 
of Julius Caesar. He belonged to a noble family, but his father 
had favored the democratic cause and his aunt 
had married Marius. Caesar as a young man 
threw himself wholeheartedly into the exciting game of politics 
as played in the capital city. He won the ear of the multitude 
by his fiery harangues, his bribes of money, and his gifts and 
public shows. After spending all his private fortune in this 
way, he was "financed" by the millionaire Crassus, who lent 
him the money so necessary for a successful career as a politician. 
Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey soon combined in what the Romans 
called a triumvirate, but what we should call a *' ring." Pompey 
contributed his soldiers, Crassus, his wealth, and Caesar, his 



Decline of the Roman City-State 137 

influence over the mob. These three men were now really 
masters of Rome. 

Caesar was ambitious. The careers of Marius, Sulla, and 
Pompcy taught him that the road to power at Rome lay through 
a military command, which would furnish an army Ca , sar > s con . 
devoted to his personal fortunes. Accordingly, quest of Gaul, 
after serving a year as consul, he obtained an 
appointment as governor of Gaul. The story of his campaigns 
there he has himself related in the famous Commentaries, still a 
Latin text in the schools. Starting from southern Gaul, which 
was Roman territory at this time, he conquered the Gallic tribes 
in one battle after another, twice bridged the Rhine and in- 
vaded Germany, made two military expeditions across the 
Channel to Britain, and brought within the Roman dominions 
all the territory bounded by the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Rhine, 
and the Atlantic Ocean. 

Caesar's conquest of Gaul widened the map of the civilized 
world from the Mediterranean basin to the shores of the Atlantic. 
Gaul soon received and speedily adopted the Latin Romaniza- 
language, Roman law, and the customs and religion tlon of Gaul 
of Rome. "Let the Alps sink," exclaimed the orator Cicero, 
"the gods raised them to shelter Italy from the barbarians, but 
now they are no longer needed." 

The death of Crassus, during Caesar's absence in Gaul, dis- 
solved the triumvirate. Pompey and Caesar soon began to 
draw apart and at length became open enemies, j^,^ ot 
Pompey had the support of the Senate, whose Pompey and 
members believed that Caesar was aiming at ffiSar 
despotic power. Caesar, on his side, had an army disciplined 
by eight years of fighting. Unable to compromise with the 
Senate, Caesar boldly led his troops across the Rubicon, the little 
stream that separated Cisalpine Gaul from Italy, and marched 
on Rome. Thus began another civil war. It was fought in 
Italy, in Spain, in Greece, and in North Africa. It ended in 
the defeat and death of Pompey, the overthrow of the senato- 
rial party, and the complete supremacy of Caesar in the Roman 
state. He ruled supreme for only two years, and then fell a 



138 Rome 

victim to a group of irreconcilable nobles, who struck him down 
in the Senate-house at Rome (44 B.C.). 

After Caesar's death his grandnephew and adopted heir, 
Octavian, joined forces with Antony, the most prominent of 
Caesar's officers, and together they defeated the 
senatorial party. They then divided the Roman 
world, Octavian taking Italy and the West, Antony taking the 
East, with Alexandria in Egypt as his capital. Before long the 
inevitable civil war broke out between them. It was decided 
in 31 B.C. by the victory of Octavian in a naval battle near 
Actium on the western coast of Greece. Antony and his 
Egyptian queen, Cleopatra, fled to Egypt, where both com- 
mitted suicide rather than fall into the conqueror's hands. The 
death of Cleopatra ended the Hellenistic dynasty of the Ptole- 
mies, rulers of Egypt since the time of Alexander the Great. 1 
Egypt henceforth became a part of the Roman dominions. 

The battle of Actium closed the century of revolution. Octa- 
vian, now without a rival, stepped into Caesar's place as master 
The end of or the Roman world. With Caesar and Octavian 
an epoch Europe thus went back to monarchy, to one-man 

rule, such as had always prevailed in the Orient. It is only 
since the end of the eighteenth century that republicanism, as 
a form of government, has begun again to find favor among 
European peoples. 

38. The Early Empire, 31 B.C-284 A.D. 

Few persons have set their stamp more indelibly on the 
pages of history than Octavian, whom we may now call by his 
The emperor more familiar name Augustus ("the Majestic"), 
Augustus conferred upon him by the Senate as a mark of 

respect. Another title borne by him and his successors was that 
of Imperator, from which our word "emperor" is derived. The 
emperor Augustus enjoyed practically unlimited power, since he 
was commander-in-chief of the army. He took care, however, 
to conceal his authority under legal forms and to pose as a 
republican magistrate holding office by appointment of the 

1 See page 105 and note 2. 



Romanized section of the Empire 

Greek section of the Empire 

Oriental section of the Empire 

I Boundary of the Roman Empire at the death of 
Augustus, 14 A. D. 




BgltOdt Kjut 26 from Orconwlch 30 



The Early Empire 139 

Senate. An American president would have a somewhat 
similar position if he ruled for life instead of for four years, 
selected the members of Congress, and designated his successor. 
In other words, Augustus gave up the externals, only to keep 
the essentials, of monarchy. 

The Roman Empire in the age of Augustus girdled the Medi- 
terranean basin. 1 On the west and south it found natural 

barriers in the Atlantic Ocean and the Sahara ,-. 

The empire 

Desert. On the east the Euphrates River divided under 
it from the kingdom of the Parthians. The north- Au e ustus 
ern frontier, beyond which lay the Teutonic peoples, required 
additional conquests for its protection. Augustus therefore an- 
nexed the districts south of the Danube, thus securing the entire 
line of this wide, impetuous stream as a boundary. Between 
Gaul and Germany the boundary continued to be the Rhine. 

The successors of Augustus made two important additions 
to the empire. During the reign of Claudius (41-54 a.d.) 
the Romans began to overrun Britain, which had c onquest and 
been left alone for nearly a century after Caesar's Romaniza- 
expeditions to the island. Britain, as far as the tion of Britain 
Scottish Highlands, was finally brought under Roman sway 
and organized as a province {Britannia). It remained a part 
of the Roman Empire for more than three hundred years, be- 
coming in this time almost as completely Romanized as Spain 
and Gaul. Northern Scotland {Caledonia) and Ireland {Hibcr- 
nia) the Romans never attempted to conquer. 

The reign of Trajan (98-117 a.d.) saw the empire enlarged to 
its greatest extent. The conquests which this soldier-emperor 
made in Asia (Armenia and the valley of the Tigris- Conquest and 
Euphrates) were abandoned by his successor on Romaniza- 
the throne ; but those in Europe, resulting in the tion of Dacifl 
annexation of Dacia, north of the Danube, had more permanence. 
Thousands of colonists soon settled in Dacia and brought with 
them Roman civilization. The modern name of this country 
(Rumania) and the Latinized language of its people bear witness 
to Rome's abiding influence there. 

1 See the map between pages 138-139. 



140 



Rome 



The Roman Empire, at the zenith of its power in the second 
century of our era, included forty-three provinces. The pro- 
Roman vincials enjoyed far better treatment by the new 
citizenship imperial government than they had ever received 
at the hands of the republican Senate. Furthermore, Augustus 
and his successors steadily extended Roman citizenship to the 
provincials, and in 212 a.d. Caracalla issued a decree making 
all freemen in the empire citizens. Henceforth, Spaniards, 
Gauls, Britons, Greeks, Syrians, and Egyptians were Romans 




Roman Pontoon Bridge 

A relief from the arch of Trajan at Rome. It shows Roman soldiers crossing the Danube. 

equally with the people of Italy. Rome, instead of being the 
ruling city of the empire, thus became merely its capital or seat 
of government. 

The provinces were protected against invasion by a standing 
army of about four hundred thousand men. The soldiers be- 
The Roman longed to all the different nationalities within the 
Peace empire and served for a long period of years. When 

not engaged in drill or border warfare, they built the great 
highways which, starting from Rome, penetrated every province ; 
erected bridges and aqueducts ; and along the exposed frontiers 
raised forts and walls. In her roads and fortifications, in the 
living rampart of her legions, Rome long found security. For 
two hundred years after Augustus the civilized world within the 



The Early Empire 



141 



boundaries of the empire rested under what an ancient writer 
calls "the immense majesty of the Roman Peace." i 

The peace and prosperity of the Empire during the first and 
second centuries of our era fostered the growth of cities. They 
were numerous, and many of them, even when Cities of the 
judged by modern standards, were large. Rome Roman 
had a population of between one and two millions. wor 
Alexandria came next in size, and Syracuse ranked as the third 
metropolis of the empire. Italy had such important centers as 
Naples, Genoa, Florence, Verona, Milan, and Ravenna. In 




;•■ 



- . 



Wall of Hadrian in Britain 

The wall extended between the Tyne and the Solway, a distance of seventy miles. It 
was built of concrete, faced with square blocks. The height is nearly twenty feet; the thick- 
ness, about eight feet. Along the wall were numerous towers and gates, and a little to the 
north of it stretched an earthen rampart protected by a deep ditch. A broad road, lined with 
seventeen military camps, ran between the two fortifications. 



Gaul were Marseilles, Bordeaux, Lyons, Paris, Strasbourg, 
Cologne, and Mainz — all places with a continuous existence 
to the present day. In Spain were Barcelona, Cadiz, Cartagena, 
and Seville. In Britain were London, York, Lincoln, and 
Chester. Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa 
contained a great number of cities, some of them established 
in Hellenistic times and others of Roman formation. 

Every city was a miniature Rome, with its forum and senate- 
house, its temples, theaters, and baths, its circus for horse 

1 Pliny, Natural History, xxvii, 1. 



142 



Rome 



racing, and its amphitheater for gladiatorial shows. The excava- 
tions at Pompeii have revealed to us the appearance of one 
„. ,.■, of these Roman cities. What we find at Pompeii 

City life r 

was repeated on a more splendid scale in hun- 
dreds of places from the Danube to the Nile, from Britain to 
Arabia. 




The Amphitheater at Arles 

The amphitheater at Aries in southern France was used during the Mid- 
dle Ages as a fortress, then as a prison, and finally became the resort of 
criminals and paupers. The illustration shows it before the removal of the 
buildings, about 1830 a.d. Bullfights still continue in the arena, where, in 
Roman times, animal-baitings and gladiatorial games took place. 



The cities of Roman origin, especially those in the western 
provinces, copied the political institutions of Rome. Each had 
City govern- a council modeled on the Senate, and a popular 
ment assembly, which chose magistrates corresponding to 

the two consuls and other officials. This Roman system of 
city government descended to the Middle Ages and so passed 
over to our own day. 

The Early Empire formed the golden age of Roman com- 
merce. Augustus and his successors put down 
Commerce . 

piracy in the Mediterranean, built lighthouses and 

improved harbors, policed the highways, and made travel 



The Early Empire 



H3 



by land both speedy and safe. An imperial currency l replaced 
the various national coinages with their limited circulation. The 
vexatious import and export duties, levied by different coun- 
tries on foreign products, were swept away. Free trade flour- 
ished between the cities and provinces of the Roman world. 




A Roman Freight Ship 

The ship lies beside the wharf at Ostia. In the after-part of the 
vessel is a cabin with two windows. Notice the figure of Victory on 
the top of the single mast and the decoration of the mainsail with 
the wolf and twins. The ship is steered by a pair of huge paddles. 

Roman commerce followed, in general, the routes which had 
been used by the Phoenicians and Greeks. The annexation of 
Gaul, Britain, and the districts north and south of Commercial 
the Danube opened up trade channels between routes 
western and central Europe and the Mediterranean basin. 
Imports from the East reached the Mediterranean either by 
caravan through Asia or by ships which sailed across the Indian 
Ocean to the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea. 

The slaves at Rome, like those at Athens, engaged in many 
occupations. They worked as farm laborers, miners, artisans, 

1 For illustrations of Roman coins see the plate facing page 148. 



144 Rome 

shopkeepers, and domestic servants. The possession of a fine 

troop of slaves, dressed in handsome livery, formed a favorite 

. , way of parading one's wealth. Not all manual 

Industry ° '.' 

labor was performed by slaves, however. Slavery 

tended to decline, partly because there were now no more wars 
to furnish captives for the slave markets and partly in 
consequence of the growing custom of emancipation. The 
free workingmen who took the place of slaves seem to have led 
a fairly comfortable existence. They were not forced to labor 
for long hours in grimy, unwholesome factories. Slums existed, 
but no sweatshops. If wages were low, so also was the cost 
of living. Wine, oil, and wheat flour were cheap. The mild 
climate made heavy clothing unnecessary and permitted an 
outdoor life. The public baths — great clubhouses — stood 
open to every one who could pay a trifling fee. Numerous 
holidays, celebrated with games and shows, brightened existence. 
It is perhaps significant that Roman annals contain no record 
of a single labor strike. 

We have already seen that the class of peasant proprietors 
disappeared from Italy during republican times. 1 It did not 
revive subsequently. Land was owned by the 
emperor and few other rich persons and was culti- 
vated by free tenants or by slaves. The person who tilled the 
soil usually depended upon his landlord for tools, domestic 
animals, and other farm equipment. Such great domains had 
long prevailed in the East under the Persians and in North 
Africa under the Carthaginians. The Romans extended this 
system of land holding to Spain, Gaul, Britain, and other prov- 
inces, and it afterward became general throughout western 
Europe during the Middle Ages, 

39. The World under Roman Rule 

The Roman Empire consisted of three sections, differing 
widely in their previous history. 2 There was an Oriental 
section, which included such parts of the Near East as had come 

1 See page 131. 2 See the map between pages 138-139. 



The World under Roman Rule 145 

under Roman rule ; there was a Greek section centering about 
the .Egean ; and there was a distinctively Roman or Latin sec- 
tion, which consisted of the western provinces. In The GrffiC0 . 
the Near East the Romans came only as conquer- Oriental- 
ors, and Roman culture never took deep root there. oman wor 
The same was true of the ^Egean lands, where the Greek lan- 
guage and customs held their ground. In the barbarian West, 
however, the Romans appeared not only as conquerors, but 
also as civilizers. The Romanization of the western provinces 
— modern Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, Switzerland, 
and England, together with the Rhine and Danube valleys 
forms quite the most significant aspect of ancient history. It 
was particularly their law and their language which the Romans 
gave to European peoples. 

The code of the Twelve Tables, 1 framed by the Romans 
almost at the beginning of the republic, was too harsh, technical, 

and brief to meet the needs of a growing state. 
™, „ 1 11 . 11-11 Roman law 

1 he Romans gradually improved their legal sys- 
tem, after they began to rule over conquered territories and 
to become familiar with the customs of foreign peoples. Roman 
law in this way took on an exact, impartial, liberal, and humane 
character. It limited the use of torture to force confession from 
persons accused of crime. It protected the child against a 
father's tyranny and wives against ill-treatment by their hus- 
bands. It provided that a master who killed a slave should be 
punished as a murderer, and even taught that all men are orig- 
inally free by nature and therefore that slavery is contrary to 
natural right. Justice it defined as "the steady and abiding 
purpose to give to every man that which is his own." 2 

The extension of Roman citizenship to the provincials carried 
this better law throughout the empire. It survived the empire. 
During the reign of Justinian (527-565 a.d.) all the The Corpus 
sources of Roman law, including the legislation of J uris Civilis 
the popular assemblies, the decrees of the Senate, the edicts of 
the emperors, and the decisions of learned lawyers, were 
collected and put into scientific form. The result was the 

1 See page 120. 2 Institutes, bk. i, tit. 1. 



146 



Rome 



famous code called the Corpus Juris Civilis, the "Body of 
Civil Law." It passed from ancient Rome to modern Europe, 
becoming the foundation of the legal systems of Italy, Spain, 
France, Germany, and other Continental countries. Even 
the Common Law of England, which has been adopted by the 
United States, owes some of its principles to the Corpus Juris 
Civilis. 1 The law of Rome, because of this widespread influ- 




Gladiators 

From a stucco relief on the tomb of Scaurus, Pompeii. Beginning at the left are two fully 
armed horsemen fighting with lances. Behind them are two gladiators, one of whom is 
appealing to the people. Then follows a combat in which the defeated party raises his hand 
in supplication for mercy. The lower part of the relief represents fights with various wild 
beasts. 

ence, is justly regarded as one of her most important gifts to 
the world. 

The Romans carried their language to the barbarian countries 
of the West, as they had carried it throughout Italy. The 
L f a d th Latin spoken by Roman colonists, merchants, 
Romance soldiers, and public officials was eagerly taken up 

languages ^ t k e natives, who tried to make themselves as 
much like their conquerors as possible. This provincial Latin 
became the basis of the so-called Romance languages — French, 

1 Roman law still prevails in the province of Quebec and the state of Louisiana, 
territories formerly belonging to France, and in all the Spanish- American countries. 



The World under Roman Rule 



147 



Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Rumanian — which arose in 
the Middle Ages. Even our English language, which comes to 
us from the speech of the Teutonic invaders of Britain, con- 
tains so many words of Latin origin that we can scarcely utter 
a sentence without using some of them. The language of Rome, 
as well as the law of Rome, still remains to enrich the intellectual 
life of mankind. 



.z r ^- ,r 
















A Roman Aqueduct 

The Pont du Gard near Nimes (ancient Nemausus) in southern France. Built by the 
emperor Antoninus Pius. The bridge spans two hilltops nearly a thousand feet apart. It 
carries an aqueduct with three tiers of massive stone arches at a height of 160 feet above the 
stream. This is the finest and best-preserved aqueduct in existence. 

It is easy, after centuries of Christian progress, to criticize 
numerous features of Roman society during the imperial age. 
The institution of slavery, an inheritance from R 
prehistoric times, condemned multitudes to bare, society: the 
hard, hopeless lives. Infanticide, especially of ar S1 e 
female children, was frequent enough among the lower classes, 
as was suicide among the upper classes. The brutal gladiatorial 
games were a passion with every one, from the emperor to his 
humblest subject. Common as divorce has now become, the 
married state was more and more regarded as undesirable. 
Augustus vainly made laws to encourage matrimony and to dis- 



148 Rome 

courage celibacy. Both educated and uneducated people 
believed firmly in magic, witchcraft, and the existence of demons. 
The decline of the earlier paganism left many men and women 
without a deep religious faith to offset the doubt and worldliness 
of the age. 

Yet this picture needs correction. It may be questioned 
whether the luxury and vice of ancient Rome, Antioch, or 
Brighter Alexandria much exceeded what our great modern 

aspects of capitals can show. During the imperial age, more- 
society over, remarkable improvements took place in 
social life. There was an increasing kindliness and charity. 
The weak and the infirm were better treated. The education of 
the poor was encouraged by 'the founding of free schools. 
Wealthy citizens lavished their fortunes on such public works 
as baths, aqueducts, and theaters, for the benefit of all classes. 
Even the slaves received better treatment. Imperial laws 
aimed to correct the abuses of neglect, overwork, and cruelty, 
and philosophers recommended to masters the exercise of 
gentleness and mercy toward their bondmen. In fact, a great 
growth of the humanitarian spirit marked the first and second 
centuries of our era. 

Just as Alexander's conquests, by uniting the Near East and 
Greece, produced a Hellenistic civilization, so now the expan- 
sion of Rome throughout the Mediterranean basin 
Interna- ° . . . ■., 

tionaliza- and beyond the Alps gave rise to a still wider 

tlon civilization, which embraced much of Europe, 

with the adjacent parts of Asia and Africa. The Roman Empire 
contained perhaps seventy-five million people, at peace with 
one another, possessing the same rights of citizenship, obeying 
one law, speaking Latin in the West and Greek in the East, and 
bound together by trade, travel, and a common loyalty to the 
imperial government. Unconsciously, but none the less surely, 
local habits and manners, national religions and tongues, provin- 
cial institutions and customs, disappeared from the ancient 
world. Rome thus made a tremendous advance toward inter- 
nationalization, toward the formation of a society embracing 
civilized mankind. 




ORIENTAL, GREEK, AND ROMAN COINS 

i. Lydian coin of about 700 B.C.; the- mate-rial is electrum, a compound of sold and sil- 
ver. 2. Gold dark, a Persian coin worth about $5. 3. Hebrew silver shekel. 4. Athenian 
silver lelradraehm, showing Athena, her olive branch, and sacred owl. 5. Roman bronze as 
(2 cents) of about 217 B.C.; the symbols are the head of Janus and the prow of a 
ship. 6. Bronze sestertius (5 cents), struck in Nero's reign ; the emperor, who carries a spear, 
is followed by a second horseman bearing a banner. 7. Silver denarius (20 rents), of about 
99 B.C. ; it shows a bust of Roma and three citizens voting. 8. Go\d solidus ($5) of Honorius, 
about 400 a.d.; the emperor wears a diadem and carries a scepter. 




I ' I -* r 






i 1» 

,: ftr 



-T 
J 



r, ^ ^ 



v^%| 




1 





•j 






ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL GEMS 

i. Steatite, from Crete; two lions with forefeet on a pedestal; above a sun. 2. Sar- 
donyx from Elis; a goddess holding up a goat by the horns. 3. Rock crystal; a bearded 
Triton. 4. Carnelian; a youth playing a trigonon. 5. Chalcedony from Athens; a Bac- 
chante. 6. Sard; a woman reading a manuscript roll; before her a lyre. 7. Carnelian; 
Theseus. 8. Chalcedony; portrait head; Hellenistic Age. 9. Aquamarine; portrait of 
Julia, daughter of the emperor Titus. 10. Chalcedony; portrait head; Hellenistic Age. 
11. Carnelian; bust portrait of the Roman emperor Decius. 12. Beryl; portrait of Julia 
Domna, wife of the emperor Septimius Severus. 13. Sapphire; head of the Madonna. 
14. Carnelian; the judgment of Paris; Renaissance work. 15. Rock crystal; Madonna 
with Jesus and St. Joseph ; probably Norman-Sicilian work. 



Christianity in the Roman World 149 

40. Christianity in the Roman World 

Several centuries before the rise of Christianity, many Greek 
thinkers began to feel a growing dissatisfaction with the crude 
faith which had come down to them from pre- Decline of 
historic times. They found it difficult to accept paganism 
the Olympian deities, who were fashioned like themselves and 
had all the faults of mortal men. For educated Romans, also, 
the beliefs and ceremonies of paganism came gradually to lose 
their meaning. Even the worship of the emperors, which helped 
to hold the Roman world together, failed to satisfy the spiritual 
needs of the age. 

The Asiatic conquests of Alexander, followed in later cen- 
turies by the extension of Roman rule over the eastern Mediter- 
ranean, brought the classical peoples in contact with N ew oriental 
new religions which had arisen in the Orient, religions 
These religions centered about some divine figure who was re- 
garded as a redeemer from sin and evil. They provided a 
beautiful, inspiring ritual, and they offered to their devotees 
the promise of a happier existence beyond the grave. Such was 
the worship of the Persian sun god Mithra and the Egyptian 
goddess Isis. Such, also, was Christianity. 

Christianity rose among the Jews, for Jesus x was a Jew and 
his disciples were Jews. The first Christians did not neglect to 
keep up the customs of the Jewish religion. It Rj se f 
was even doubted for a time whether any but Jews Christianity 
could properly be allowed within the Christian fold. A new 
convert, Saul of Tarsus, afterward the Apostle Paul, did most 
to admit the Gentiles, or pagans, to the privileges of the new 
religion. Though born a Jew, Paul had been trained in the 
schools of Tarsus, a city of Asia Minor which was a center of 
Greek culture. His education thus helped to make him an 
acceptable missionary to Greek-speaking peoples. During 
more than thirty years of activity Paul established churches in 
Asia Minor, Macedonia, Greece, and Italy. He wrote to these 

1 Born probably in 4 B.C., during the reign of Augustus; crucified during the reign 
of Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was the Roman governor of Judea. 



i5° 



Rome 



churches the letters (epistles) which have a place in the New 
Testament and set forth many doctrines of the Christian faith. 
Christianity spread rapidly over the Roman world. It was 
carried, as the other Oriental religions had been carried, by 
Spread of slaves, soldiers, traders, travelers, and missionaries. 
Christianity The use f Greek and Latin as the common lan- 
guages of the Roman Empire furnished a medium in which 

Christian speakers and 
writers could be readily 
understood. The early mis- 
sionaries, such as Paul 
himself, were often Roman 
citizens, who enjoyed the 
protection of Roman law 
and profited by the ease of 
travel which the imperial 
rule had made possible. 
Moreover, the destruction 
of Jerusalem by the Ro- 
mans (70 a.d.) and the 
subsequent exile of Jews 
from Palestine (135 a.d.) 
spread the Chosen People 
throughout the Roman 

Empire, where they famil- 
Interior of the Catacombs .^^ ^ pagang wkh 

The catacombs of Rome are underground ceme- . . 

teries in which the Christians buried their dead. Jewish ldealS Ot mOnOtUe- 
The bodies were laid in recesses in the walls of the ^ gm ^nd moral purity and 
galleries or underneath the pavement. Several tiers _ , . 

of galleries (in one instance as many as seven) lie one With Jewish UOpeS tor a 
below the other. Their total length has been esti- ]ty[ es siah thus preparing 
mated at no less than six hundred miles. The illus- . . . 

tration shows a small chambet or cubiculum. The the way tor Christianity. 
graves have been opened and the bodies taken away. ^ nQ of^er period in an- 
cient history were conditions so favorable for the growth of a 
world religion. 

The imperial government, which had treated other foreign 
faiths with careless indifference, or even with favor, which had 
tolerated the Jews and granted to them special privileges of 




Christianity in the Roman World 151 

worship, made a deliberate effort to crush Christianity. The 
reason was that it seemed to threaten the existence of the 
state. Converts to the new religion condemned the The perse- 
official paganism as idolatrous; they refused to cutions 
swear by pagan gods in courts of law; they would not worship 
the genius (guardian spirit) of the emperor or burn incense before 
his statue, which stood in every town. Naturally, the Christians 
were outlawed and from time to time were subjected to persecu- 
tions in various parts of the empire. The last persecution, 
early in the fourth century, was the most severe. It continued 
for eight years, but failed to shake the constancy of the Chris- 
tians. They welcomed the torture and death which would 
gain for them a heavenly crown. Those who perished were 
called "martyrs," that is, "witnesses" to Christ. 

The imperial government at length realized the uselessness of 
the persecutions, and in 313 a.d. Constantine and his colleague, 
Licinius, issued the Edict of Milan, which pro- Triumph of 
claimed for the first time in history the principle of Christianity 
religious toleration. This edict placed Christianity on a legal 
equality with the other religions of the empire. Constantine 
himself accepted Christianity and favored it throughout his 
reign. Under his direction the first general council of the 
Church assembled in 325 a.d. at Nicaea in Asia Minor to settle 
a dispute over the nature of Christ. The council framed the 
Nicene Creed, which is still the accepted summary of Christian 
doctrine. Christianity continued to progress after Constantine 
and became the state religion by the close of the fourth cen- 
tury. Sacrifices to the pagan gods were henceforth forbidden, 
the temples closed, the Delphic oracle and Olympian games for- 
bidden, and even the private worship of ancestors prohibited. 

The new religion certainly helped to soften and refine manners 
by the stress which it laid upon such "Christian" virtues as 
humility, tenderness, and mercy. By dwelling on Christianity 
the sanctity of human life, it did its best to repress and Roman 
the practice of suicide and infanticide. It set its socie y 
face sternly against the obscenities of the theater and the 
cruelties of the gladiatorial shows. Even more original contri- 



The Later Empire 153 

buttons of Christianity to civilization lay in its social teachings. 
The belief in the fatherhood of God implied a corresponding 
belief in the brotherhood of man. This doctrine of human 
equality had been expressed before by pagan philosophers, but 
Christianity translated the precept into practice. Christianity 
also laid much emphasis on the virtue of charity and the duty of 
supporting all institutions which aimed to relieve the lot of the 
poor, the sick, and the downtrodden. 

41. The Later Empire, 284-476 A.D. 

The third century formed a very unsettled period in the history 
of the Roman Empire. There were many civil wars between 
rival pretenders to the throne ; there were constant The em _ ire 
inroads of Teutonic peoples upon the European under 
provinces and of Persians (successors of the Par- 10C etian 
thians) upon the Asiatic provinces. The empire, indeed, was 
unwieldy. One man, however able and energetic, had more 
than he could do to govern all of it and protect the distant 
frontiers on the Rhine, the Danube, and the Euphrates. Diocle- 
tian, a common soldier who rose from the ranks and became 
emperor in 284 a.d., recognized this fact and appointed a second 
emperor to rule jointly with himself. He took the East ; his 
colleague took the West. 

Diocletian also remodeled the provincial system, in the 
interest of efficiency. The entire empire, including Italy, was 
divided into one hundred and twenty provinces, a centralized 
grouped into thirteen dioceses and four prefectures. 1 monarchy 
Henceforth a regular gradation of public officials reached from 
the lowest provincial magistrates to the governors of the prov- 
inces, the vicars of the dioceses, the prefects of the prefectures, 
and finally to the emperors themselves. The Roman Empire 
thus became a centralized monarchy. 

The Roman Empire likewise became an absolute monarchy. 
The old republican forms which Augustus had so carefully pre- 
served disappeared, and the emperor stood forth frankly as the 

1 The numlicr and arrangement of these divisions varied somewhat durinp the 
fourth century. See the map mi page 155 for the system as it existed aboUl 395 A.D. 



154 Rome 

master of the state. He assessed the taxes, framed edicts 
having the force of laws, and acted as the supreme judge. He 
An absolute t°dk the title of "Lord and God" and required his 
monarchy subjects to pay him divine honors both in life and 
after death. He introduced all the pomp of an Oriental court. 1 
His diadem of pearls, his purple robes, his throne, his scepter, 
all proclaimed the autocrat, and have furnished models for 
imitation by European sovereigns even to the present day. 

The emperor Constantine (sole ruler 324-337 a.d.) estab- 
lished another capital for the Roman world at the old Greek city 

of Byzantium, 2 on the European side of the Bos- 
A new capital ■ , ■, . ^ 

porus. it soon took his own name as Constanti- 
nople, the "City of Constantine." The new capital had a 
better commercial site than Rome, for it stands in Europe, 
looks on Asia, and commands the entrance to both the Black 
Sea and the Mediterranean. Far more than Rome it was now 
the military center of the empire, being about equidistant from 
the Teutonic barbarians on the lower Danube and the Persians 
on the Euphrates. The city was no less favorably situated for 
defense. It resisted siege after siege and for eleven centuries 
was the capital of what was left of the Roman Empire. 3 

Diocletian's system of "partnership emperors" and Con- 
stantine's transfer of the capital from Italy to the Balkan 
S a at' n of P enmsu l a on ty emphasized the growing separation 
East and of East and West. The Roman Empire tended 

more and more to divide into two states, and after 
Constantine they were never more than temporarily reunited, 
They had very different histories. The Roman Empire in the 
East, though threatened by enemies from without and weakened 
by civil conflicts from within, managed to endure until the end 
of the Middle Ages. The Roman Empire in the West lasted 
only until the close of the fifth century. By that time 
Teutonic peoples had established independent kingdoms in 
Britain, Gaul, Spain, and North Africa. When in 476 a.d. 
the barbarians in Italy deposed Romulus Augustulus ("the little 

1 See page 41. 2 See page S3. 

3 Until the capture of the city by the Ottoman Turks in 1453 a.d. 



The Later Empire 



155 



Augustus"), whose name, curiously enough, recalled that of 
the legendary founder of Rome and that of its first emperor, 
there was no longer any Roman ruler in the West. The empire 
went on at Constantinople, or New Rome, but Old Rome itself 
passed into barbarian hands. 



Prefectures of 

THE ROMAN EMPIRE 

about 305 A.D. 

□ Prefecture 1 1 Prcfcctur< 
of Gaul I I of lllyricu 

□ Profectura r- 1 — r Prefecture 
of Italy I 1 of the East 

Scale of Miles 




L.r- . ti. j *i 



The collapse of the imperial system in the western provinces 
was due to many causes, but we need stress only one. The 
empire made no provision for local self-government, xhe "fall" 
Not only did the numerous slaves and serfs lack of Rome 
political rights, but Roman citizens, as well, took no part in 
managing the affairs of state. They had simply to pay taxes 
and take orders from the officials whom the emperor placed over 
them. Even the imperial armies came to be made up pre- 
dominantly of barbarians instead of native-born Romans. It 
-y to see that under such circumstances a genuine patriotism 
non-existent. The people looked to their all-powerful 
government to protect them ; when it failed to do so they could 



156 Rome 






not, or would not, protect themselves. The "fall" of Rome 
then followed, inevitably. 

We are not to suppose that the settlement of the barbarians 
within the Roman Empire ended with the deposition of Romulus 
Transition to Augustulus, near the close of the fifth century, 
the Middle The following centuries witnessed fresh invasions 
ges and the establishment of new Teutonic states. 

The study of these troubled times leads us from the classical 
to the medieval world, from the history of antiquity to the 

history of the Middle Ages. 

Studies 

1. Identify the following dates : 264 B.C.; 133 B.C.; 44 B.C. ; 31 B.C. ; 212 a.d. ; 
284 a.d.; and 476 a.d. 2. Why have Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica been called 
the "suburbs of Italy"? Which island does not belong to the present Italian 
Kingdom? 3. Give the meaning of our English words " patrician, " "plebeian," 
"dictator," "tribune," and "veto." 4. Compare the Roman Senate and the 
Senate of the United States as to size, term of office of members, conditions of 
membership, functions, and importance. 5. Compare the nature of Roman rule 
in Italy with that of Athens over the Delian League. 6. Trace on the map facing 
page 122 the principal Roman roads in Italy, with their terminal points. 7. Com- 
ment on this statement: "As the rise of Rome was central in history, the Second 
Punic War was central in the rise of Rome." 8. Might Rome have extended her 
federal policy to her territories outside of Italy ? Was a provincial system really 
necessary? g. What contrasts can you draw between Gesar and Alexander the 
Great? 10. How do you account for the failure of the republican institutions of 
Rome? 11. What modern countries are included within the limits of the Roman 
Empire at its greatest extent ? 12. Compare the extent of the Roman Empire under 
Trajan with (a) the empire of Alexander and (6) the empire of Darius. 13. What 
was the Pax Romana ? What is the Pax Britannica ? 14. Give the Roman names 
of Italy, Spain, Gaul, Gerrnany, Britain, Scotland, and Ireland. 15. On an out- 
line map indicate the location of all the Roman cities mentioned in this chapter. 
16. Trace on the map between pages 138-139 the principal Roman roads in the 
provinces. 17. Compare the Romanization of the ancient world with the process 
of Americanization now going on in the United States. 18. Trace on the map, 
page 152, the journeys of the Apostle Paul. 19. To what cities of the Roman 
Empire did Paul write his Epistles? 20. "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of 
the Church." Explain this statement. 21. What reasons may be given for the 
conversion of the Roman world to Christianity? 22. "The emperor of the first 
century was a prince, that is, ' first citizen ' ; the emperor of the fourth century was 
a sultan." Comment on this statement. 23. Define the terms absolutism and 
centralization as applied to a government. 24. What arguments might have 
been made for and against the removal of the capital to Constantinople? 25. What 
is meant by the "fall" of the Roman Empire? 26. "The Roman Empire is the 
lake into which all the streams of ancient history lose themselves and which all the 
streams of modern history flow out of." Comment on this statement. 27. Enu- 
merate some of the principal contributions of the Romans to civilization. 



CHAPTER V 
THE MIDDLE AGES 1 

42. The Germans 

The period called the Middle Ages is not well defined either 
as to its beginning or its close. For an initial date we have 
selected the year 476, when the imperial provinces Lim j ts of 
in the West were almost wholly occupied by Teu- the Middle 
tonic peoples. The Roman Empire had now been g 
dismembered, and barbarian kingdoms, destined to become in 
later centuries the national states of western Europe, had been 
formed in Italy, Spain, Gaul, and Britain. For concluding dates 
we may take those of the invention of printing (about 1450), the 
capture of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks (1453), the 
discovery of America (1492), and the opening of a new sea- 
route to the East Indies (1498). Such significant events, all 
falling within the second half of the fifteenth century, seem to 
mark the end of medieval and the beginning of modern times. 
The student will understand, however, that it is really impossible 
to separate by precise dates one historic period from another. 
The change from antiquity to the Middle Ages and, again, from 
the medieval to the modern world was in each case a gradual 
process extending over several centuries. The truth is that 
the social life of man forms a continuous growth, and man's 
history, an uninterrupted stream. 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter i, "Stories of the 
Lombard Kings"; chapter ii, "Charlemagne"; chapter iv, "The Reestablishmenl 
of Christianity in Britain"; chapter v, "St. Boniface, the Apostle to the Germans"; 
chapter vi, "The Teachings of Mohammed "; chapter vii, "The Saga of a Viking"; 
chapter viii, "Alfred the Great"; chapter be, "William the Conqueror and the 
Normans in England"; chapter xii, "Richard the Lion-hearted and the Capture 
of Constantinople"; chapter xiv, "St. Louis"; chapter xv, "Episodes of tin- 
Hundred Years' War"; chapter wi, "Menu irs "t' a French Courtier," 

'57 



158 The Middle Ages 

The medieval period falls into two divisions of about equal 
length. The first, or early Middle Ages, formed in western 
Divisions of Europe an era of turmoil, ignorance, and decline, 
the Middle consequent upon the barbarian invasions. It 
required a long time for the Teutonic peoples to 
settle in their new homes and to become thoroughly fused with 
the Romanized provincials. The process of absorption was 
practically completed by the end of the tenth century. Western 
Europe then entered upon the later Middle Ages, an era of more 
settled government, increasing knowledge, and steady progress 
in almost every field of human activity. The medieval period 
thus presents to the historical eye not a level stretch of a thou- 
sand years, with mankind stationary, but rather first a down- 
ward and then an upward slope. 

The region called Germany (Germania) in antiquity reached 

from the Rhine eastward as far as the Vistula and from the' 

_ Danube northward to the Baltic Sea. Germany 

Germany . J 

consisted of dense forests, extensive marshes, and 
sandy plains, incapable of supporting a large population. 
Clouds and mists enveloped the country in summer, and in 
winter it lay buried under snow and ice. Such unfavorable 
conditions retarded the development of Germany, which was 
also shut out from the Mediterranean basin by mountain 
barriers. Hence the inhabitants had not advanced in civiliza- 
tion as far as the Greeks and Romans. 

The Germans belonged principally to the Baltic (Nordic) 
racial type. 1 Their tall stature, blue eyes, and blonde or ruddy 
Inhabitants hair marked them off from the shorter and darker 
of Germany Mediterranean peoples. They spoke a Teutonic 
language, related, on the one hand, to Greek and Latin and, on 
the other hand, to the Celtic, Lettic, and Slavic tongues. 2 In 
culture they were barbarians, who had passed from the use of 
stone and bronze to that of iron; who hunted, fished, kept 
cattle, and tilled the soil; who formed tribes and tribal con- 
federations; and who lived in villages or small towns. Some 

1 See page 66. 

2 See the chart on page 18. 



The Germans 1 59 

of the Germans nearest the Romans learned from the latter to 
read and write, to make better weapons and clothes, to use 
money, to enjoy foreign luxuries, and, what was most impor- 
tant, to accept Christianity. The common religion of Germans 
and Romans paved the way for friendly intercourse between 
them. 

The Roman Empire had long been full of Germans. Many 
were mercenaries in the imperial army. Augustus began the 
practice of hiring them as soldiers, and by the time The Ger _ 
of Constantine they formed the majority of the mans and 
troops. The emperors also admitted friendly tribes 
of Germans within the frontiers to fill up the gaps in popula- 
tion and to farm the waste lands. Still other Germans entered 
the empire as slaves. The result was a very considerable 
" barbarization " of the Roman world before the period of in- 
vasions. 

The love of fighting for its own sake, the desire for adventure, 
and the lust for booty explain, in part, the Germanic invasions. 
But only in part. They were principally due to The inva _ 
land hunger. When the soil of Germany, as people sions: their 
then understood how to use it, could no longer 
sustain increasing numbers, the inhabitants had the alter- 
native of migration or starvation. It was the same grim 
alternative that has confronted man at every stage of savagery, 
barbarism, and civilization. The Germans chose to migrate, 
even though that meant war, and so from the time of Marius 
and Julius Caesar not a century passed without witnessing some 
dangerous movement by them against the frontiers of the 
Roman Empire. 

The invasions were of two types. Sometimes entire peoples 
migrated, as was the case with the Visigoths (West Goths), 
Ostrogoths (East Goths), Vandals, Burgundians, The invfl . 
and Lombards. They all settled among a much sions: their 
more numerous subject population, which in time 
absorbed them. None of their kingdoms proved to be enduring. 
Sometimes, again, bands of warriors, led by military chiefs, 
set out from their home land and conquered possessions at the 



l6o The Middle Ages 

expense of the provincials. Such was especially the case with 
the Franks in the northern part of Gaul and the Anglo-Saxons 
in Britain. The Frankish and Anglo-Saxon kingdoms were the 
only ones which developed into lasting states during the 
Middle Ages. 

Ancient civilization suffered a great shock when the Germans 
descended on the Roman Empire. They were unlike the pro- 
German vincials in dress and habits of life. They lived un- 
influence der different laws, spoke different languages, and 
obeyed different rulers. Even when they settled 
peaceably within the empire, they allowed aqueducts, bridges, 
and roads to go without repairs, and theaters, baths, and public 
buildings to sink into ruins. As they were without apprecia- 
tion of education, they failed to keep up schools, universities, 
and libraries. Being devoted chiefly to agriculture, they permit- 
ted both industry and commerce to languish. Ancient 
civilization had been declining before the Germans came. The 
invasions accelerated the decline, with the result that large 
parts of western Europe relapsed for several centuries into 
semi-barbarism. 

Nevertheless, the Germans had the capacity to learn, and 
the willingness to learn, from those whom they had conquered. 
Fusion of Their fusion with the Romans was helped by 
Germans the previous settlement within the empire of so 

many German soldiers, colonists, and slaves. It 
was very greatly helped by the fact that some of the principal 
peoples, including the Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Vandals, Bur- 
gundians, and Lombards, were already Christians at the time 
of their invasions, while other peoples, including the Franks and 
Anglo-Saxons, afterward adopted Christianity. Finally, as 
observed above, the Germans invaded the empire to seek homes 
for themselves, rather than simply to pillage and destroy. They 
accepted what they understood of Graeco-Roman culture and 
then imparted to the enfeebled provincials their fresh blood, 
youthful minds, and vigorous, progressive life. The fusion of 
Germans and Romans formed the great work of the early Middle 
Ages in western Europe. 



The Hoi}- Roman Empire 161 

43. The Holy Roman Empire 

During the fifth century, while the Visigoths were finding a 
home in southern Gaul and Spain, the Ostrogoths in Italy, the 
Burgundians in the Rhone Valley, and the Vandals The Franks 
in North Africa, still another German people began under Clovis 
to spread over northern Gaul. They were the Franks, who had 
long held lands on both sides of the lower Rhine. Their leader, 
Clovis, conquered the kingdom of Syagrius, 1 the only fragment 
of the Roman Empire remaining in Gaul, and then proceeded 
to annex the territories of his German neighbors. He built up 
in this way a great Frankish state. 

The Franks were still heathen when they entered upon their 
career of conquest. Clovis, however, had married a Burgundian 
princess, Clotilda, who was a devout Roman Catho- christianiza- 
lic and an ardent advocate of Christianity. The tion of the 
story is told how, when Clovis was hard pressed 
by the Alamanni in a battle near Strasbourg, he vowed that if 
Clotilda's God gave him victory he would become a Christian. 
The Franks won, and Clovis, faithful to his vow, had himself 
and three thousand warriors baptized into the Roman Catholic 
faith. By this act the king secured the loyalty of his Christian 
subjects in Gaul and won the favor of Rome. The friendship 
between the popes and the Frankish rulers afterward ripened 
into a close alliance. 

The power which Clovis founded stood the test of time. For 
more than two hundred and fifty years the successors of Clovis 
were the strongest rulers in western and central The pranks 
Europe. During the eighth century they helped after Clovis, 
to keep Europe Christian by beating back the 5II ~ 7 
Moslem Arabs, who, having seized Spain from the Visigoths, 
invaded Gaul and threatened to make that country also a 
Moslem land. At last we reach a Frankish king who created a 
Christian and German empire to replace the empire of Rome. 
This king was Charles the Great, or Charlemagne. 2 

1 See the map fa> ing pagi 1 < 
The French form of his name, from the Latin Carolus Magnus. 



l62 



The Middle Ages 



Much of Charlemagne's reign (768-814) was filled with war- 
fare. He conquered the Lombards, who had taken Italy from 
Charie- tne Ostrogoths. He invaded Spain and wrested 

magne's from the Moslems a considerable district south 

conques s Q £ ^ py renees jjis long struggle with the Saxons 
and various Slavic peoples farther widened the Frankish domin- 
ions. Charlemagne at the 
height of his power ruled over 
what is now France, Belgium, 
Holland, Switzerland, Austria, 
western Germany, northern 
Italy, and northern Spain, be- 
sides a part of Czecho-Slovakia 
and Jugoslavia. In this truly 
gigantic realm all the surviving 
Teutonic peoples, except those 
in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, 
and Britain, were brought 
under the sway of one man. 

Charlemagne was a states- 
man as well as a warrior. He 
Charie- divided his posses- 

magne's sions into coun- 

government i 1 j 1 

ties, each ruled by 

a count, who was expected to 




Charlemagne 



Lateran Museum, Rome 
A. mosaic picture made during the lifetime of 
Charlemagne, and probably a fair likeness of keep Order and administer JUS- 

him ' tice. The border districts, 

which lay exposed to invasion, were organized into "marks," 
or "marches," under the military supervision of margraves 
(marquises). These officials had so much power and lived 
so far from the royal court that Charlemagne appointed special 
agents, called the "lord's messengers," to travel from county 
to county and make sure that his orders were everywhere 
obeyed. It is interesting to compare this system of government 
with that which prevailed in the Persian Empire under Darius 
the Great. 1 

1 See page 39. 



The Holy Roman Empire 163 

Charlemagne did something for the promotion of education 
and art among the Franks. He encouraged the establishment 
of schools in the monasteries and cathedrals, where ch ar i e _ 
the sons of both freemen and serfs might be trained magne's civ- 
for the Christian ministry. He formed his court * zing wor 
into a "school of the palace," in which learned men from Italy, 
Spain, and England gave instruction to his own children and 
to those of his nobles. He also erected churches and palaces in 
various parts of the Frankish realm. All this civilizing work 
formed only a hopeful beginning. Centuries were to pass before 
education and art in western Europe fully recovered from 
the low state to which they had fallen during the Germanic 
invasions. 

Charlemagne, the champion of western Christendom and the 
foremost ruler in Europe, seemed to the men of his time the 
rightful successor of the Roman emperors. He The emperor 
had their power, and now he was to have their Charie- 
name. On Christmas Day, 800, the pope, in old magne ' °° 
St. Peter's Church at Rome, placed on his head a golden crown, 
while all the people cried out with one voice, "Long life and 
victory to Charles Augustus, the great and pacific emperor of 
the Romans, crowned by God!" 

The coronation of Charlemagne was regarded by his con- 
temporaries as the restoration or renewal of the Roman Empire, 
more than three hundred years after the deposition The emDire 
of Romulus Augustulus. 1 But Charlemagne's em- of Charle- 
pire did not include North Africa, Britain, or much magne 
of Spain, or the Roman dominions in the East, over which the 
emperors at Constantinople had ruled, and were still to rule, 
for centuries. It did include, on the other hand, extensive 
territories east of the Rhine and north of the Danube, which 
the Romans had never been able to conquer. Moreover, the 
German Charlemagne and his German successors on the imperial 
throne had little in common with the old Roman emperors, who 
spoke Latin, administered Roman law, and regarded the Ger- 
mans as their most dangerous foes. Charlemagne's empire was, 

1 Sec page 155. 



164 



The Middle Ages 



indeed, largely a new creation, the result of an alliance between 

the Frankish Kingdom and the Roman Church. 

The empire of Charlemagne passed to his only legitimate son, 

a weak ruler, who had difficulty enough in keeping it intact. 

_. . . . After the latter' s death the empire was divided 

Division of 

Charle- among Charlemagne s three grandsons, though 

magne's on iy one cou y no ]d the imperial title. Disputes 

empire . . c 

which soon arose about the inheritance found a 

temporary settlement in a treaty concluded at Verdun (843). 
Lothair, the oldest brother, received North Italy and a narrow 
strip of land along the valleys of the Rhine and the Rhone, 
between the North Sea and the Mediter- 
ranean. Louis and Charles, the other 
brothers, received kingdoms lying to the 
east and west, respectively, of Lothair's 
territory. These arrangements have his- 
torical importance, because they fore- 
shadowed the future map of western 
Europe. The East Frankish kingdom of 
Louis, inhabited almost entirely by Ger- 
mans, was to develop into modern 
Germany. The West Frankish kingdom 
of Charles, inhabited mainly by descend- 
ants of Romanized Gauls, was to become modern France. 
Lothair's kingdom, however, never became one national state. 
A part of it now belongs to the kingdom of Italy, and another 
part survives as Belgium, Holland, Luxemburg, and Switzerland. 
The imperial idea was revived, about one hundred and fifty 
years after Charlemagne's death, by an able German ruler, 

Tt,^ ^„^r- Otto I, often called Otto the Great. Otto led his 
Ine emperor ' 

Otto the armies across the Alps, went to Rome, and had the 

rea , 9 2 p p 6 crown him as Roman emperor (962). Otto's 
dominions were considerably smaller than Charlemagne's, 
since they included only Germany and North Italy. Never- 
theless, Otto and the emperors who followed him asserted vast 
claims to sovereignty in Europe, as the heirs of Charlemagne 
and, through him, of Constantine and Augustus. The new 




Ring Seal of Otto 
the Great 

The inscription reads 
Oddo Rex. 



The Holy Roman Empire 



165 



empire came subsequently to be styled the Holy Roman Empire, 
the word Holy in its title expressing its intimate connection with 
the Papacy. It lived on in some measure for more than eight 
hundred years and did not quite disappear from European 
politics until the opening of the nineteenth century. 




Europe in the Age of Otto the Great, 962 a.d. 

The successors of Otto the Great constantly interfered in the 
affairs of Italy, in order to secure the Italian crown and the 
imperial title. They treated that country as a 
conquered province which had no right to a national and Italy in 
life and an independent government under its ^ ie e ^ Ilddle 
own rulers. At the same time, they neglected 
their German possessions and failed to keep their powerful 
territorial lords in subjection. Neither Italy nor Germany, in 



1 66 The Middle Ages 

consequence, became a united state, such as was formed in 
England, France, Spain, and other countries during the later 
Middle Ages. 

44. The Northmen and the Normans 

Our study of central and western Europe during the early 
Middle Ages has so far been confined to the Germans. We ha.ve 
Re ewed ^^ out °^ s ig nt another group of Teutonic peoples, 

Teutonic in- who lived, as their descendants still live, in Den- 
vasions mar k, Sweden, and Norway. They were the 

Northmen. 1 Their settlement of the Scandinavian countries 
probably began long before the Christian era, but they do not 
appear in history until about the time of Charlemagne. The 
Northmen had taken no part in the earlier invasions. During 
the ninth century, however, the same land hunger which drove 
the German tribes southward made them quit their bleak, 
sterile country and seek new homes across the water. The 
invasions of the Northmen may be regarded, therefore, as the 
last wave of that great Teutonic movement which had previ- 
ously inundated western Europe and overwhelmed the Roman 
Empire. 2 

The Northmen were barbarous and heathen, untouched either 
by Graeco-Roman culture or by the Christian religion. They 
started out as raiders and fell on the coasts of 
settlements western Europe. In their shallow boats they also 
of the found it easy to ascend the rivers and reach places 

far inland. Their attacks did so much damage and 
inspired such great terror that a special prayer was inserted in 
the church services: "From the fury of the Northmen, good 
Lord, deliver us." The Northmen eventually planted settle- 
ments in some of the lands which they visited, including a 
considerable part of Ireland and Scotland. 

The Northmen soon discovered Iceland. Colonization began 
in 874. The first settlement of Greenland was the work of an 
Icelander, Eric the Red, who reached the island toward the 

1 Also called Vikings, or "inlet men," from the Norse vik, a bay or fiord. 

2 See the map facing page 160. 



The Northmen and the Normans 



167 



end of the tenth century. He called the country Greenland, 
not because it was green, but because, as he said, "there is 
nothing like a good name to attract settlers." Leif The North _ 
Ericsson, his son, voyaged still farther westward, men in the 

W'est 

and about the year 1000 he seems to have visited 

the coast of North America. The Northmen, however, did not 

settle permanently in the New World. 




- ' ."S^b" 



A Viking Ship 

A Viking chieftain, after his days of sea-roving had ended, was sometimes buried in his 
ship, over which a grave chamber, covered with earth, would be erected. Several such burial 
ships have been discovered. The Gokstad vessel, shown in the illustration, is of oak, twenty 
eight feet long and sixteen feet broad in the center. It has seats for sixteen pairs of rowers, a 
mast for a single sail, and a rudder on the right or starboard side. The gunwale was decorated 
with a series of shields, painted alternately black and gold. 

The Norwegians had taken the leading part in the exploration 
of the West. The Swedes, on account of their geographical 
situation, were naturally the most active in expe- The North _ 
ditions to the East. They overran Finland, whose men in the 
rude inhabitants, the Finns, were of Asiatic origin. 
Sweden ruled Finland throughout the Middle Ages. The 
Swedes also entered Russia as early as 862, and their leader, 
Ruric, established a dynasty which reigned over Slavic peoples 
for more than seven hundred years. 

The history- of the Northmen in France began in 911, when a 
French king granted to a Viking chieftain, Rollo, dominion 



i68 



The Middle Ages 



over the region about the lower Seine. Rollo agreed to accept 
Christianity and to acknowledge the French ruler. The dis- 
Normandy tr * ct ce( led to Rollo was later called the duchy 
and the of Normandy. Its Scandinavian settlers, hence- 

forth known as Normans, 1 soon became thorough- 
ly French in language and culture. 




A Scene from the Bayeux Tapestry 

Museum of Bayeux, Normandy 
The Bayeux Tapestry, which almost certainly belongs to the time of the Norman Conquest, 
is a strip of coarse linen cloth, about 230 feet long by 20 inches wide, embroidered in worsted 
thread of eight different colors. There are seventy-two scenes picturing various events in the 
history of the Norman Conquest. The illustration given above represents an attack of Nor- 
man cavalry on the English shield wall at the battle of Hastings. 

One of the dukes of Normany, the famous William the Con- 
queror, added England to the Norman dominions, as the result 
Norman con- °* n * s v i ctor y i R tne battle of Hastings (1066). 
quest of The island had previously been overrun by Jutes, 

ng an Angles, and Saxons after the middle of the fifth 

century, and by the Danes during the ninth, tenth, and eleventh 
centuries. The Normans thus contributed a third Teutonic 
element to the English population. 

During the eleventh century the Normans found still another 
Norman con- field in which to display their energy and daring, 
quest of They turned southward to the Mediterranean and 

Italy and created in southern Italy and Sicily a Norman 

Sicil y state known as the kingdom of the Two Sicilies. 

The Normans governed it for only about one hundred and fifty 

1 "Norman" is a softened form of "Northman." 



Feudalism 169 

years, but under other rulers it lasted until the middle of the 
nineteenth century, when the present kingdom of Italy came 
into existence. 

45. Feudalism 

The ninth century in western Europe was a period of disorder. 
Charlemagne for a time had arrested the disintegration of 
society which resulted from the invasions of the Dec i ine f 
Germans, and had united their warring tribes the royal 
under something like a centralized government. au on y 
But Charlemagne's empire, as we have learned, did not long 
survive its founder. It soon broke up into separate kingdoms. 
The successors of Charlemagne in France, Germany, and Italy 
enjoyed little real authority. They reigned, but did not rule. 
During this dark age it was really impossible for a king to 
govern with a strong hand. The absence of good roads or of 
other easy means of communication made it difficult for him 
to move troops quickly from one district to another, in order to 
quell revolts. Even had good roads existed, the lack of ready 
money would have prevented him from maintaining a strong 
army devoted to his interests. Moreover, the king's subjects, 
as yet not welded into a nation, felt toward him no sentiments 
of loyalty and affection. They cared far less for their king, of 
whom they knew little, than for their own local lords who 
dwelt near them. 

The decline of the royal authority, from the ninth century 
onward, meant that the chief functions of government came 
to be more and more performed by the nobles, i ncrease( i 
who were the great landowners of the kingdom, power of the 
Under Charlemagne these men had been the 
king's officials, appointed by him and holding office at his 
pleasure. Under his successors they tended to become almost 
independent princes. In proportion as this change was accom- 
plished during the Middle Ages, European society entered 
upon the stage of feudalism. 1 

■The word comes from the medieval Latin feudum, from which are derived the 
French fief and the English fee. 



170 The Middle Ages 

Feudalism in medieval Europe was not a unique development. 
Parallels to it may be found in other parts of the world. When- 
Parallels to ever the state becomes incapable of protecting 
European life and property, powerful men in each locality 
will themselves undertake this duty; they will 
assume the burden of their own defense and of those weaker 
men who seek their aid. Such was the situation in ancient 
Egypt for several hundred years, in medieval Persia, and in 
modern Japan until about two generations ago. 

European feudalism arose and nourished in the- countries 
which had formed Charlemagne's empire, that is, in France, 
Extent of Germany, and northern Italy. It also spread to 

European Bohemia, Hungary, Poland, and the Christian 
states of Spain. Toward the close of the eleventh 
century the Normans transplanted it into England, southern 
Italy, and Sicily. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 
the crusaders introduced it into the kingdoms which they 
founded in the East. Still later, in the fourteenth century, the 
Scandinavian countries became acquainted with feudalism. 

The basis of feudal society was usually the landed estate. 
Here lived the feudal noble, surrounded by dependents over 
Feudal which he exercised the rights of a petty sovereign, 

sovereignty jj e cou \^ tax them; he could require them to give 
him military assistance; he could try tliem in his courts. A 
great noble even enjoyed the privilege of declaring war, making 
treaties, and coining money. How, it will be asked, did these 
rights and privileges arise? 

Owing to the decay of commerce and industry, land had be- 
come practically the only form of wealth in the early Middle 
Feudal ten- Ages. The king, who was regarded as the absolute 
ure of land owner of the soil, would pay his officials for their 
services by giving them the use of a certain amount of land. 
In the same way, one who had received large estates would 
parcel them out among his followers, as a reward for their 
support. Sometimes an unscrupulous noble might seize the 
lands of his neighbors and compel them to become his tenants. 
Sometimes, too, those who owned land in their own right might 



Feudalism 171 

surrender the title to it in favor of a noble, who then became 
their protector. An estate in land which a person held of a 
superior lord, on condition of performing some "honorable" 
service, was called a fief. A fief was inheritable, going at the 
holder's death to his oldest son. If a man had no legal heir, the 
fief went back to the lord. 

The tie which bound the tenant who accepted a fief to the 
lord who granted it was called vassalage. Every holder of land 
was in theory, though not always in fact, the vassal 
of some lord. At the apex of the feudal pyramid 
stood the king, the supreme landlord, who was supposed to hold 
his land from God; below the king stood the greater lords 
(dukes, marquises, counts, barons), with large estates; and 
below them came the lesser lords, or knights, whose possessions 
were considered to be too small for further subdivision. 

The vassal owed various services to the lord. In time of war 
he did garrison duty at the lord's castle and joined him in 
military expeditions. In time of peace the vassal 
attended the lord on ceremonial occasions, gave v ice S s °and Se " 
him the benefit of his advice, when necessary, and money pay- 

,i ii- -i • . ■ /-Hi 1 ments of the 

helped him as a judge in trying cases, lne vassal, vassal 
under certain circumstances, was also required to 
make money payments. When a new heir succeeded to the 
fief, the 16rd received from him a sum usually equivalent to one 
year's revenue of the estate. This payment was called a " relief. " 
Again, if a man sold his fief, the lord demanded another large 
sum from the purchaser, before giving his consent to the transac- 
tion. Vassals were also expected to raise money for the lord's 
ransom, in case he was made prisoner of war, to meet the ex- 
penses connected with the knighting of his eldest son, and to 
provide a dowry for his eldest daughter. Such exceptional pay- 
ments went by the name of "aids." 

The vassal, in return for his services and payments, looked to 
the lord for the protection of life and property. The lord agreed 
to secure him the enjoyment of his fief, to guard The lord , s 
him against his enemies, and to see that in all duty to the 
matters he received just treatment. vass 



172 The Middle Ages 

The ceremony of homage symbolized the whole feudal rela- 
tionship. One who proposed to become a vassal and hold a fief 

„ came into the lord's presence, bareheaded and un- 

Homage 

armed, knelt down, placed his hands between those 

of the lord, and promised henceforth to become his "man" 

(Latin homo). The lord then kissed him and raised him to his 

feet. After the ceremony the vassal placed his hands upon the 

Bible, or upon sacred relics, and swore to remain faithful to his 

lord. This was the oath of "fealty." The lord then gave the 

vassal some object — a stick, a clod of earth, a lance, or a glove — 

in token of the fief with the possession of which he was now 

"invested." 

It is clear that the feudal tenure of land, coupled with the 
custom of vassalage, made in some degree for security and order. 
Feudalism a Each noble was attached to the lord above him by 
form of local the bond of personal service and the oath of fealty. 
govemmen r^ Q ^ vass£ j s beneath him he was at once pro- 
tector, benefactor, and friend. Unfortunately, feudal obli- 
gations were not always strictly observed. Both lords and 
vassals often broke their engagements, when it seemed profit- 
able to do so. Hence they had many quarrels and indulged in 
constant warfare. But feudalism, despite its defects, was 
better than anarchy. The feudal nobles drove back the pirates 
and hanged the brigands and enforced the laws, as no feeble 
king could do. Feudalism provided a rude form of local gov- 
ernment for a rude society. 

The outward mark of feudalism was the castle, where the lord 
resided and from which he ruled his fief. Defense formed the 
The castle as primary purpose of the castle. Until the introduc- 
a fortress duction of gunpowder and cannon, the only siege 

weapons employed were those known in ancient times. They 
included machines for hurling heavy stones and iron bolts, 
battering rams, and movable towers, from which the besiegers 
crossed over to the walls. Such engines could best be used on 
firm, level ground. Consequently, a castle would often be erected 
on a high cliff or hill, or on an island, or in the center of a swamp. 
A castle without such natural defenses would be surrounded by 



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174 The Middle Ages 

a deep ditch (the "moat"), usually filled with water. If the 
besiegers could not batter down or undermine the massive walls, 
they adopted the slower method of a blockade and tried to 
starve the garrison into surrendering. Ordinarily, however, a 
well-built, well-provisioned castle was impregnable. 

A visitor to a castle crossed the drawbridge over the moat and 
approached the narrow doorway, which was protected by a tower 
The castle as on each side. If he was admitted, the iron grating 
a home ("portcullis") rose slowly on its creaking pulleys, 

the heavy, wooden doors swung open, and he found himself in 
the courtyard, commanded by the great central tower ("keep"), 
where the lord and his family lived, especially in time of war. 
At the summit of the keep rose a platform whence a sentinel 
surveyed the country far and wide; below, two stories under- 
ground, lay the prison, dark, damp, and dirty. As the visitor 
walked about the courtyard, he came upon the hall, used as the 
lord's residence in time of peace, the armory, the chapel, the 
kitchens, and the stables. A spacious castle might contain all 
the buildings necessary for the support of the lord's servants 
and soldiers. 

The nobles regarded the right of waging war on one another 
as their most cherished privilege. A vassal might fight with each 
Private of the various lords to whom he had done homage, 

warfare ^ or( j er to secure independence from them, with 

bishops and abbots whom he disliked for any reason, with his 
weaker fellow vassals, and even with his own vassals. Fighting 
became almost a form of business enterprise, which enriched the 
nobles and their retainers through the sack of castles, the plun- 
der of villages, and the ransom of prisoners. Every hill became 
a stronghold and every plain, a battle-field. Such private war- 
fare, though rarely very bloody, spread havoc throughout the 
land. As the power of the kings increased in western Europe, 
they naturally sought to put an end to the constant fighting 
between their subjects. The Norman rulers of Normandy, 
England, and the Two Sicilies restrained their turbulent nobles 
with a strong hand. Peace came later in most parts of the Con- 
tinent; in Germany, "fist right" (the rule of the strongest) pre- 



Feudalism 



175 



Knighthood 



vailed until the end of the fifteenth century. The abolition of 
private warfare was the first step in Europe toward universal 
peace. The second step — the abolition of public war between 
nations — is yet to be taken. 

The prevalence of private warfare made the use of arms a 
profession requiring special training. A nobleman's son served 
for a number of years as a squire in his father's 
castle or in that of some other lord. When he 
became of age and had been drilled in warlike exercises, he might 
be made a knight. The 
ceremony of conferring 
knighthood was often most 
elaborate. If, however, a 
squire for valorous con- 
duct received knighthood 
on the battle-field, the 
accolade by stroke of the 
sword formed the only 
ceremony. 

As manners 
and Christian 
began to af- 
fect feudal 

society, knighthood devel- 
oped into chivalry. The 
Church, which opposed the warlike excesses of feudalism, took 
the knight under her wing and bade him be always a true 
soldier of Christ. To the rude virtues of fidelity to one's 
lord and bravery in battle, the Church added others. The 
"good knight" was he who respected his sworn word, who 
never took an unfair advantage of another, who defended 
women, children, and orphans against their oppressors, and 
who sought to make justice and right prevail in the world.' 
Needless to say, the "good knight" appears oftener in romance 
than in sober history. While chivalry lasted, it produced some 
improvement in manners, particularly by insisting on the ideal 
of personal honor and by fostering greater regard for women 



softened 
teachings 

Chivalry 




Mounted Knight 

Seal of Robert Fitzwalter, showing a mounted 
knight in complete mail armor; date about 1265. 



176 The Middle Ages 

(though only those of the upper class). Our modern notion of 
the conduct befitting a "gentleman" goes back in part to the old 
chivalric code. Chivalry, however, expressed simply the senti- 
ments of the warlike nobles. It was an aristocratic institution. 
The knight despised and did his best to keep in subjection the 
toiling peasantry, upon whose backs rested the real burden of 
feudal society. 

46. The Byzantine Empire 

If western Europe during the early Middle Ages presented a 
scene of violence and confusion, while the Teutonic peoples 
The Greek were settling in their new homes, a different picture 
or Byzantine was presented in eastern Europe. Here the Roman 

mpire Empire survived and continued to uphold, for 

nearly a thousand years after the deposition of Romulus Augus- 
tulus, the Roman tradition of law and order. After 476 it is 
often called the " Greek Empire," since it became more and more 
Greek in character, owing to the loss of the western provinces in 
the fifth century and then of Syria and Egypt in the seventh 
century. The name "Byzantine Empire," which is in common 
use, most appropriately describes the empire in still later times, 
when its possessions were reduced to Constantinople (ancient 
Byzantium) and the territory in the neighborhood of that city. 
The long life of the Byzantine Empire is one of the marvels 
of history. Its vitality appears the more remarkable, when one 
Vitality of the cons iders that it had no easily defensible frontiers, 
Byzantine contained many different peoples with little in 

mpire common, and on all sides faced hostile states. 

The empire lasted so long, because of its vast wealth and re- 
sources, its despotic, centralized government, the strength of 
its army, and the almost impregnable position occupied by 
Constantinople, the capital city. 

The history of the Byzantine Empire shows how constantly 
Importance of ^ was en g a g e d in contests with Oriental peoples 
the Byzan- — first the Persians, then the Arabs, and finally 
tine Empire thg Tur k s _ w h attacked its domains. By resist- 
ing the advance of the invaders, the old empire protected the 




Interior 
SANCTA SOPHIA, CONSTANTINOPLE 
Built by Justinian and dedicated on Christmas Day, 538 a.d. The main building is 
roofed over by a great central dome, 107 feet in diameter and 179 feet in height. After the 
Ottoman Turks turned the church into a mosque, a minaret was erected at each of the four 
exterior angles. The outside of Sancta Sophia is somewhat disappointing, but the interior, 
with its walls and columns of polished marble, granite, and porphyry, is magnificent. The 
crystal balustrades, pulpits, and large metal disks are Turkish. 



The Byzanl ine Empire 



'77 



ynuiig st;itr> o! Kurope, until they had become strong enough 
to meet and repulse the hordes of Asia. This service was not 
less important than that which had been performed by Greece 
and Rome in the contests with the Persians and the Cartha- 
ginians. 1 



i 1 Lands of the Eastern emperors 

I ' before 900 A.D. 

I 1 The lands conquered between 

I 1 960 A.D. and 1015 A.D. 




The Byzantine Empire During the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries 

The merchant ships of Constantinople carried on much of the 
commerce of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The 
products of Byzantine industry were exchanged at B vzant i ne 
that city for the spices, drugs, and precious stones commerce 
of the East. Byzantine wares also found their way an in us ry 
into Italy and France and, by way of the Russian rivers, reached 
the heart of eastern Europe. Russia, in turn, furnished Con- 
stantinople with honey, wax, fur, wool, grain, and slaves. A 
traveler of the twelfth century well described the city as a 
metropolis ''common to all the world, without distinction of 
country or religion." 

Many of the emperors at Constantinople were great builders. 
Byzantine architecture became a leading form of art. Its most 



1 Sec pages 8g an-' 



i 7 8 



The Middle Ages 



striking feature is the dome, which replaces the flat, wooden 
roof used in the churches of Italy. The exterior of a Byzantine 
Byzantine church is plain and unimposing, but the interior 
art is adorned on a magnificent scale. The eyes of 

the worshipers are dazzled by the walls faced with marble 
slabs of variegated colors, by the columns of polished marble, 
jasper, and porphyry, and by the brilliant mosaic pictures of 




Naval Battle Showing Use of "Greek Fire" 

From a Byzantine manuscript of the fourteenth century at Madrid. " Greek fire " in marine 
warfare was most commonly propelled through long tubes of copper, which were placed on the 
prow of a ship and managed by a gunner. Combustibles might also be kept in tubes flung by 
hand and exploded on board the enemy's vessel. 

gilded glass. The entire impression is one of richness and 
splendor. Byzantine artists, though mediocre painters and 
sculptors, excelled in all kinds of decorative work. Their carv- 
ings in wood, ivory, and metal, together with their embroideries, 
enamels, miniatures and mosaics, enjoyed a high reputation in 
medieval Europe. 

The libraries and museums of Constantinople preserved classi- 
cal learning. In the flourishing schools of that city the wisest 
Byzantine men of the day taught philosophy, law, medicine, 
scholarship anc j sc i en ce to thousands of pupils. It is true that 
Byzantine scholars were more erudite than original. Impressed 
by the great treasures of knowledge about them, they found it 
difficult to strike out into new, unbeaten paths. Most students 



The Byzantine Empire 179 

were content to make huge collections of extracts and notes 
from the books which antiquity had bequeathed to them. 
Even this task was useful, however, for their encyclopedias 
contained much information which otherwise would have been 
lost. The East thus cherished the productions of classical 
learning, until the time came when the West was ready to 
receive them and to profit by them. 

The division of the Roman Empire and the removal of the 
capital to Constantinople brought about the gradual separation 
of Eastern and Western Christianity. The Eastern The Greek 
or Greek Church had for its spiritual head the pa- Church 
triarch of Constantinople, just as the Western or Roman Church 
had a head in the pope or bishop of Rome. The two churches 
remained in formal unity until 1054, when disputes between 
them on points of doctrine led to their final rupture. They have 
never since united. The missionary zeal of the Greek Church 
resulted in the conversion of the barbarians who entered south- 
eastern Europe during the early Middle Ages. At the present 
time, most of the Christian inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula, 
including Greeks, Jugoslavs, Bulgarians, and Rumanians, belong 
to the Greek Church. Its greatest victory was the conversion 
of the Russians, toward the close of the tenth century. With 
Christianity all these peoples received the use of letters and some 
knowledge of Roman law and methods of government. Constan- 
tinople was to them, henceforth, such a center of religion and 
culture as Rome was to the Germans. 

The heart of Byzantine civilization always continued to be 
Constantinople. It was the largest, most populous, and most 
wealthy place in medieval Europe. When London, Constanti- 
Paris, and Venice were small and mean towns, nople 
visitors to Constantinople found paved and lighted streets, 
parks, public baths, hospitals, theaters, schools, libraries, 
museums, beautiful churches, and magnificent palaces, far 
surpassing anything in the West. The renown of Constantinople 
penetrated even into barbarian lands. The Northmen called it 
Micklegarth, the "Great City"; the Russians knew of it as 
Tsarigrad, the "City of the Caesars." Both names did not lack 



180 The Middle Ages 

appropriateness, but its own people best described it as the 
"City guarded by God." 

47. The Arabs and Islam, 622-1058 

Christianity was not the only great religion of the Middle 
Ages. Six centuries after it arose came Islam, the religion of 
A new world the Arabs. Islam did for half Asia and North 
religion Africa what Christianity had begun to do for 

medieval Europe in the work of assimilating the peoples and 
binding them together in one vast community irrespective of 
race or language. 

Arabia during ancient times had appeared in history mainly 
as a reservoir of Semitic-speaking nomads, who drifted into 
The Arabs Egypt, along the eastern shores of the Mediter- 
before ranean, and into Babylonia, yet always leaving a 

nucleus of tribes behind them to supply fresh 
invasions in the future. The interior of the peninsula, except 
for occasional oases, was a desert, over which Bedouin tribes 
wandered with their sheep, cattle, horses, and camels. Along 
the southern and western coasts were patches of fertile land, 
whose inhabitants had reached a considerable degree of civiliza- 
tion. They practiced agriculture, engaged in traffic upon the 
Red Sea and Indian Ocean, and lived in walled towns. Every 
year for four months the Arabs ceased fighting with one another 
and went on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Here stood a famous 
sanctuary called the Kaaba (Cube). It contained idols and a 
small black stone (probably a meteorite), which was regarded 
with particular veneration. Although most of the Arabs were 
idolaters, yet some of them believed in Allah, the "Unknown 
God" of the Semites. The many Jews and Christians in Arabia 
at this time also helped to spread abroad the conception of one 
God and thus to prepare the way for the prophet of a mono- 
theistic religion. 

The founder of Islam, Mohammed, was born at Mecca about 
Mohammed's 5 70. Having been left an orphan at an early age, 
early life j^ received no regular education and for some 

time earned his living as a shepherd and camel driver. His 






a » < 
~ 3 « 



« a ;- 




181 



182 The Middle Ages 

marriage to a rich widow enabled him to settle down as a prosper- 
ous though still undistinguished, merchant at Mecca. Moham- 
med, however, seems always to have been spiritually minded. 
When he was forty years old the call came to him in a vision 
(he said) to preach a new religion to the Arabs. It was very 
simple, but in its simplicity lay its strength, "There is no god 
but God, and Mohammed is the prophet of God." 

Mohammed made his first converts in his wife, his children, 
and the friends who knew him best. Then, becoming bolder, he 
The Hegira, began to preach publicly. In spite of his eloquence 
622 and obvious sincerity, he met a discouraging recep- 

tion. A few slaves and poor freemen became his followers, but 
most people regarded him as a madman. Mohammed's disci- 
ples, called Moslems, 1 were bitterly persecuted by the citizens 
of Mecca, who resented the prophet's attacks on idolatry. 
Finally, Mohammed and his converts took refuge in the city 
of Medina, where some of the inhabitants had already accepted 
his teachings. This was the famous Hegira (Flight of the 
Prophet). 2 

At Medina Mohammed occupied a position of high honor and 
influence. . The people welcomed him gladly and made him 
Later life of their chief magistrate. As his adherents increased 
Mohammed j n num ber, Mohammed began to combine fighting 
with preaching. His military expeditions against the Arab 
tribes proved very successful. Many of the conquered Bedouins 
enlisted under his banner and at length captured Mecca for 
the Prophet. He treated its inhabitants leniently, but threw 
down the idols in the Kaaba. After the submission of Mecca 
the Arabs throughout the peninsula abandoned idolatry and 
accepted the new religion. 

The religion which Mohammed taught is called Islam, an 
Arabic word meaning "surrender" or "resignation." This re- 

1 From the Arabic muslim, "one who surrenders himself" (to God's will). 
During the Middle Ages the Moslems to their Christian enemies were commonly 
known as Saracens, a term which is still in use. 

2 The year 622, in which the Hegira occurred, marks the beginning of the Mos- 
lem era. 



The Arabs and Islam 183 

ligion has a sacred book, the Koran. It contains the speeches, 
prayers, and other utterances of Mohammed, at various times 
during his career. The doctrines found in the R e ij g i ous 
Koran show many adaptations from the Jewish and teachings of 
Christian religions. Like them, Islam empha- 
sizes the unity of God and the immortality of the soul. Like 
them, also, Islam recognizes the existence of prophets, includ- 
ing Abraham, Moses, and Jesus (whom it regards as a prophet), 
but insists that Mohammed was the last and greatest of the 
prophets. The account of the creation and fall of man is taken, 
with variations, from the Old Testament. The descriptions of 
the resurrection of the dead and the last judgment, and the 
division of the future world into paradise and hell, the former for 
believers in Islam, the latter for those who have refused to 
accept it, were also largely borrowed from other religions. 

The Koran imposes on the faithful Moslem five great obliga- 
tions. First, he must recite, at least once in his life, aloud, cor- 
rectly, and with full understanding, the short Observances 
creed: "There is no god but God, and Mohammed of Islam 
is the prophet of God." Second, he must pray five times a 
day: at dawn, just after noon, before sunset, just after sunset, 
and at the end of the day. Before engaging in prayer the 
worshiper washes face, hands, and feet; during the prayer he 
turns toward Mecca and bows his head to the ground. Third, 
he must observe a strict fast, from morning to night, during 
every day of Ramadan, the ninth month of the Mohammedan 
year. Fourth, he must give alms to the poor. Fifth, he must, 
"if he is able," undertake at least one pilgrimage to Mecca. 
The annual visit of tens of thousands of pilgrims to the holy 
city helps to preserve the feeling of brotherhood among Moslems 
all over the world. These five obligations are the "pillars" 
of Islam. 

As a religious system Islam is exceedingly simple. It does 
not provide any elaborate ceremonies of worship and permits 
no altars, pictures, or images in the mosque. Islam Organiza- 
even lacks a priesthood. Every Moslem acts as tionofIslam 
his own priest. There is, however, an official who on Friday, the 



1 84 The Middle Ages 

Mohammedan Sabbath, offers up public prayers in the mosque 
and delivers a sermon to the assembled worshipers. All work is 
suspended during this service, but at its close secular activities 
are resumed. 

The Koran furnishes a moral code for the adherents of Islam. 
It contains several noteworthy prohibitions. The Moslem is 
Moral teach- not ^° ma k e images, to engage in games of chance, 
ingsofthe to eat pork, or to drink wine. The Koran also 
inculcates many active virtues, including reverence 
toward parents, protection of widows and orphans, charity 
toward the poor, kindness to slaves, and gentle treatment of 
the lower animals. On the whole, it must be admitted that the 
regulations of the Koran did much to restrain the vices of the 
Arabs and to provide them with higher standards of right and 
wrong. Islam marked a great advance over Arabian heathenism. 

Islam was a conquering religion, for it proclaimed the righteous- 
ness of a "holy war" against unbelievers. Pride and greed also 
Arab combined with fanaticism to draw the Arabs out 

conquests OI fa e desert upon a career of conquest. The map 
shows how large a part of the civilized world, from the Indus 
westward to the Pyrenees, came under their sway within about 
a century after the death of Mohammed. The Arabs failed, 
however, to capture Constantinople, which endured a desperate 
siege by the combined Moslem army and navy (716-717), and 
the Franks checked their farther advance into western Europe 
at the bloody battle of Tours (732). The Arabs treated their 
subjects with liberality. No massacres and no persecutions 
occurred. The conquered peoples were not compelled to accept 
Islam at the point of the sword. In course of time, however, 
many Christians in Syria and Egypt and most of the Zoroastri- 
ans x in Persia embraced the new religion, in order to avoid 
paying tribute and to acquire the privileges of Moslem citizen- 
ship. 

The title of caliph, meaning "successor" or "representative," 
had been first assumed by Mohammed's father-in-law, who was 

1 See page 54. 




j.H; 



1 86 The Middle Ages 

chosen to succeed the Prophet as the political and religious head 
of Islam. Disputes between rival claimants to this ofhce before 
The cali- long split up the Arabian Empire into two caliph- 

phate ateSj one ru li n g a t Bagdad over the Moslems in 

Asia, the other ruling at Cordova in Spain. A third caliphate, 
with its capital at Cairo in Egypt, afterward arose in North 
Africa. The dismemberment and consequent weakening of the 
Arabian Empire ended for a time the era of Moslem conquest. 

The Arabs lacked the Roman genius for empire-building, but 
they rivaled the Romans as absorbers and spreaders of civilization. 
Arabian Their conquests brought them into contact with 

culture thg highly civilized peoples of the Near East and 

along the shores of the Mediterranean. What they learned 
from Greeks, Syrians, Persians, Jews, and Hindus they im- 
proved upon, thus building up a culture which for several cen- 
turies far surpassed that of western Europe. The Arabs prac- 
ticed farming in a scientific way, understood rotation of crops, 
employed fertilizers, and knew how to graft and produce new 
varieties of plants and fruits. Their manufactures, especially 
of textile fabrics, metal, leather, glass, and pottery, were cele- 
brated for beauty of design and perfection of workmanship. 
They did much in mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, geogra- 
phy, and medicine, carrying further the old Greek investigations 
in these branches of science. Arab universities, libraries, and 
observatories, especially in Spain, were visited by Christian 
students, who became acquainted with Moslem learning and 
helped to introduce it into Italy, France, and other countries. 
Painting and sculpture owe little to the Arabs, but their archi- 
tecture, based in part on Byzantine and Persian models, reached 
a high level of excellence. The influence of the Arabs upon our 
civilization is shown by the Arabic origin of such words as 
"muslin," "damask," "mattress," "cupola," "zenith," and 
"cipher," and especially of words beginning with the prefix 
al (the definite article in Arabic). In English these include 
"algebra," "alkali," "alcohol," "almanac," "alcove," "Aldeb- 
aran" (the star), and "alchemy" (whence "chemistry"). 

The Arabian Empire in Asia was overrun during the eleventh 



The Crusades 187 

Century by the Scljuk Turks, whose leader assumed in 1058 the 
caliph's political authority at Bagdad. The coming of the Seljuk 
Turks into the Near East was a very great misfor- The Arabs 
tune, for these barbarians did nothing to preserve andtheSel- 
and extend Arabian culture. They did begin, how- JU 
ever, a new era of Moslem conquest, and within a few years they 
had won almost all Asia Minor from the Byzantine Empire. 
The new Turkish menace to Christendom induced the emperor 
at Constantinople to call on the chivalry of western Europe for 
aid, thus inaugurating the crusades. L ^^^— 

48. The Crusades, 1095-1291 

The crusades, in their widest aspect, may be regarded as a 
renewal of the age-long contest between East and West, in which 
the struggle of Greeks and Persians and of Romans The crusades 
and Carthaginians formed the earlier episodes. mhlstor y 
The contest assumed a new character when Europe had become 
Christian and Asia, Mohammedan. It was not only two con- 
trasting types of civilization, but also two rival world religions, 
which in the eighth century faced each other under the walls of 
Constantinople and on the battle-field of Tours. Now, during 
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, they were to meet again. 
Throughout this period there was an almost continuous move- 
ment of crusaders to and from the Moslem possessions in 
Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. 

The crusades were first and foremost a spiritual enterprise. 
They sprang from the pilgrimages which Christians had long 
been accustomed to make to the scenes of Christ's The crusa des 
life on earth. Men considered it a wonderful and pil- 
privilege to visit the place where He was born, gnmage£ 
to kiss the spot where He died, and to kneel in prayer at His 
tomb. The eleventh century saw an increased zeal for pil- 
grimages, and from this time travelers to the Holy Land were 
very numerous. For greater security they often joined them- 
selves in companies and marched under arms. It needed little 
to transform such pilgrims into crusaders. The Arab conquests 
had not interrupted the stream of pilgrims, for the early caliphs 



i88 



The Middle Ages 




were more tolerant of unbelievers than Christian rulers were of 
heretics. After the conquests of the Seljuk Turks pilgrimages 
became more difficult and dangerous. The stories which floated 
back to Europe of the outrages on Christian pilgrims and 

shrines awakened an 
intense desire to res- 
cue the Holy Land 
from "infidels." 

But the crusades 
were not simply an 

The crusades ex P res " 
and the sion of 

upper classes , , 

the sim- 
ple faith of the Middle 
Ages. Something more 
than religious enthus- 
iasm sent an unend- 
ing procession of 
soldiers along the 
Combat between Crusaders and Moslems highways of Europe 

A picture in an eleventh-century window, formerly and Qver ^ trackless 

in the church of St. Denis, near .Fans. 

wastes of Asia Minor 
to Jerusalem. The crusades, in fact, appealed strongly to the 
warlike instincts of the feudal nobles. They saw in an expedition 
against the East an unequaled opportunity for acquiring fame, 
riches, lands, and power. The Normans were especially stirred by 
the prospect of adventure and plunder which the crusading 
movement opened up. By the end of the eleventh century they 
had established themselves in southern Italy and Sicily, from 
which they now looked across the Mediterranean for additional 
lands to conquer. Norman knights formed a very large element 
in several of the crusading armies. 

The crusades also attracted the lower classes. The misery of 
The lower ^ e common people in medieval Europe was so 
classes and great that for them it seemed not a hardship, but 
the crusades j-^gj. a Ye \[ e f } to leave their homes in order to 
better themselves abroad. Famine and pestilence, poverty 



The Crusades 



189 



and oppression, drove them to emigrate hopefully to the golden 
East. 

The first crusade, which began in 1095, resulted in the cap- 
ture of Jerusalem and the setting up of several small cru- 
saders' states in Syria. These Course of 
possessions were defended by the crusades 
two orders of fighting monks, known as 
the Hospitalers and the Templars. The 
Christians managed to keep Jerusalem for 
somewhat less than one hundred years. 
Acre, their last post in Syria, did not fall 
to the Moslems until 1291, an event com- 
monly regarded as the end of the crusades. 
The Hospitalers still retained the islands 
of Cyprus and Rhodes, which long served 
as a barrier to Moslem expansion over 
the Mediterranean. 

The crusades, judged by what they set 
out to accomplish, must be accounted a 
failure. After two centuries Th e Crusad es 
of conflict, and after a great and feudal- 
expenditure of wealth and ism 
human lives, the Holy Land remained in 
Moslem hands. The indirect results of the 
crusades were, nevertheless, important. Effigy or a Knight 
For instance, they helped to undermine 

Temple Church, London 

feudalism. Thousands of nobles mort- <.. , xrc .. ... . amnr 

snows the kind of armor 

gaged or sold their lands in order to raise worn between noo and 
money for a crusading expedition. Thous- I22S ' 

ands more perished in Syria, and their estates, through failure of 
heirs, reverted to the crown. Moreover, feudal warfare, that 
curse of the Middle Ages, also tended to die out with the depar- 
ture for the Holy Land of so many turbulent lords. 

The crusades created a constant demand for the transpor- 
tation of men and supplies, encouraged shipbuilding, and 
extended the market for eastern wares in Europe. The pro- 
ducts of Damascus, Mosul, Alexandria, Cairo, and other great 




190 The Middle Ages 

cities were carried across the Mediterranean to the Italian 

seaports, whence they found their way into all European lands. 

„ , The elegance of the Orient, with its silks, tapes- 

The crusades ° ' . ■ , 

and Medi- tries, precious stones, perfumes, spices, pearls, 

terranean anc j i vor y was s0 enchanting that an enthus- 
commerce . 

iastic crusader is said to have called it "the 

vestibule of Paradise." 

The crusades also contributed to intellectual and social pro- 
gress. They brought the inhabitants of western Europe into 
The crusades c l° se relations with one another, with their fellow 
and Euro- Christians of the Byzantine Empire, and with the 
pean cu ure na j-j ves f Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. The 
intercourse between Christians and Moslems was particularly 
stimulating, because the East at this time surpassed the West 
in civilization. The crusaders enjoyed the advantages which 
come from travel in strange lands and among unfamiliar peoples. 
They went out from their castles or villages to see great cities, 
marble palaces, superb dresses, and elegant manners; they 
returned with finer tastes, broader ideas, and wider sympathies. 
The crusades opened up a new world. 

49. Mongolian Peoples in Europe to 1453 

The extensive steppes of central Asia 1 have formed, for 
thousands of years, the abode of nomad ic tr ibes belonging to 
Asiatic the Mongolian or Yellow Race. They were ever 

nomadism on ^ e movej w ith their horses, oxen, sheep, and 
cattle, from one pasturage to another. They dwelt in tents 
and hut-wagons. Severe simplicity was their rule of life, for 
property consisted of little more than flocks and herds, clothes, 
and weapons. Constant practice in riding and scouting inured 
them, to fatigue and hardship, and the daily use of arms made 
every man a soldier. (When population increased too rapidly, 
or when the steppes dried up and water failed, the inhabitants 
had no course open but to migrate farther and farther in search 
of foody Some of them overflowed into the fertile valleys of 

1 See the map between pages 28-29. 



Mongolian Peoples in Europe 



191 



China, until at the close of the third century b. c. the Chinese 
rulers built the Great Wall, fifteen hundred miles in length, to 
keep them out. Others turned westward and entered Europe 
between the Caspian Sea and the Ural Mountains, where 
the Asiatic steppes merge into the plains of Russia. 1 




Hut-wagon of the Mongols (Reconstruction) 

On the wagon was placed a sort of hut or pavilion made of wands bound together with 
narrow thongs. The structure was then covered with felt or cloth and provided with latticed 
windows Hut-wagons, being very light, were sometimes of enormous size. 

One such nomadic people were the Huns, whom we find north 
of the Black Sea during the fourth century a. d. Roman writers 
describe their olive skins, little, turned-up-noses, 

Huns 

black, beady eyes, and generally ferocious char- 
acter. They spent much of their time on horseback, sweeping 
over the country like a whirlwind and leaving destruction and 
death in their wake. It was the pressure of the Huns from 
behind which drove the Visigoths against the Roman frontiers, 
thus beginning the Germanic invasions. The Huns subsequently 
crossed the Carpathians and occupied the region now called 
after them Hungary. Their leader, Attila, built up a military 
power, obeyed by many barbarous tribes from the Black Sea 
to the Rhine. Attila devastated the lands of the eastern emperor 
almost to the walls of Constantinople and then invaded Gaul. 



1 See the map between pages 34-35- 



192 



The Middle Ages 




Bulgarians 



In this hour of danger Gallo-Romans and Germans united their 
forces and at the famous battle of Chalons (451) saved western 
Europe from being submerged under a wave of Asiatic barbarism. 
Attila died soon afterward, his empire went to pieces, and the 
Huns themselves mingled with the peoples whom they had 
conquered. 

The Bulgarians, who were akin to the Huns, made their 
appearance south of the lower Danube in the seventh century. 

For more than three 
hundred years these 
barbarians, fierce and cruel, formed 
a menace to the Byzantine Empire. 
They settled in the country which 
now bears their name, accepted 
Christianity from Constantinople, 
and adopted the speech and cus- 
toms of the Slavs. Modern Bulgaria 
is essentially a Slavic state. 

The JVIagyars entered central 
Europe toward the close of the 
ninth century. Again 
and again they swept 
into Germany, France, and northern 
Italy, ravaging far and wide. It was 
Otto the Great who stopped their 
raids. The Magyars now retired to their lands about the middle 
Danube, became Roman Catholic Christians, and founded the 
kingdom of Hungary. Modern Hungarians, except for their 
Asiatic language, are thoroughly Europeanized. 

In the thirteenth century came the Mo ngols ^ proper, (or 
Their original home seems to have been northern 
Mongolia. The genius of one of their leaders, 
Jenghiz Khan, united them into a vast, conquering 
host, which to ruthless cruelty and passion for plunder added 
extraordinary efficiency in warfare. It may be said with truth 
of Jenghiz Khan that he had the most victorious of military 
careers and that he constructed the most extensive empire 



Magyars 



A Mongol 

After a Chinese drawing 



Tatars). 

Mongols 



Mongolian Peoples in Europe 



193 



exposed it to the 
forceof the 



known to history. The map shows what an enormous stretch 
of territory — Christian, Moslem, heathen, and Buddhist — was 
overrun by Jenghiz Khan and his immediate successors. The 
Mongol Empire was very loosely organized, however, and 
during the fourteenth century it fell apart into a number of 
independent states, or khanates. 

The location of Russia 

full x^'^-'-,,. 

Russia 

Mongol under the 

a 1 1 a c k . Monsols 
The cities of Moscow 
and Kiev fell in quick 
succession, and before 
long the greater part of 
the country became a 
part of the Golden 
Horde, as the western 
section of the Mongol 
realm was called. The 
Mongols are usually 
said to have Oriental- 
ized the Russian people. 

It seems clear, however, that they did not interfere with 
the language, religion, or laws of their subjects. The chief 
result of the Mongol conquest was to cut off Russia from the 
civilization of the rest of Europe for upwards of three centuries. 
In 1227, the year of Jenghiz Khan's death, a small Turkish 
horde, driven westward from central Asia by the Mongol 
advance, settled in Asia Minor. There they en- ottoman 
joyed the protection of their kinsmen, the Scljuk Turks 
Turks, and accepted Islam. Their chieftain Othman (whence 
the name Ottoman) founded a new empire. During the first 
half of the fourteenth century the Ottom an Turks firmly estab- 
lished themselves in northwestern Asia Minor, along the beau- 
tiful shores washed by the Bosporus, the Sea of Marmora, and 
the Dardanelles. The second half of the same century found 




Mohammed II 

A medal showing the strong face of the conqueror of 
Constantinople. 



194 The Middle Ages 

them in Europe, wresting province after province from the 
feeble hands of the eastern emperors. All that remained of the 
Byzantine Empire was Constantinople and a small district in 
its vicinity. 

Only a crusade, on a greater scale than any in the past, could 
have saved Constantinople. No crusade occurred, and in 1453 
Capture of ^ e c *ty ^ e ^ to Mohammed II. The capture of Con- 
Constantino- stantinople.is rightly regarded as an epoch-making 
event. It meant the end, once for all, of the empire 
which had served so long as the rearguard of Christian civiliza- 
tion, as the bulwark of the West against the East. Europe stood 
aghast at a calamity which she had done so little to prevent. 
The Christian powers have been paying dearly, even to our own 
age, for their failure to save Constantinople from Moslem hands. 

Unlike the Bulgarians and the Magyars, the O ttom an Turks 

never entered the European family of nations. Preserving their 

Asiatic language and Moslem faith, they remained 
Southeast- ,, ^ .,, 

em Europe m southeastern Europe, not a transitory scourge, 

under the but an abiding oppressor of Christian lands. The 
Turks isolation of the Turks prevented them from assimi- 

lating the higher culture of the peoples whom they 
conquered. They never created anything in science, art, litera- 
ture, commerce, or industry. Conquest was the Turks' one 
business in the world, and when they ceased conquering their 
decline set in. But it was not until the end of the seventeenth 
century that the Turkish Empire entered on that downward 
road which has now led to its practical extinction as a European 
power. 

50. National States during the Later Middle Ages 

Europe in 1914 included twenty national states. More have 
been added as a result of the World War. Their present boun- 
Geo phi- daries only in part coincide with those fixed by 
cal boun- geography. The British Isles, it is true, constitute 

dd.Fl 6 S 

a single political unit, as nature seems to have 
intended, but Ireland remains a very unwilling member of the 
United Kingdom. The Iberian Peninsula, bounded on the 



I* I Dominions of \\ 1 1 1 1 > 1 1 > lli. r,.iiiniemr. liM',ii-.s7 

W*ns: Independence suppressed by Edward I, 
1284; inrorpornt.il willi Knuhind l.y ll.im Mil, ir.:it! 

Bdoiuhd; Independence recognized by Edward ,„.„.„„ 
lolned with England in n personal union' un- 
dar Junta I, 1603; legislative union with England] 1701 

[■■laxd: Oonqueal completed by Oromwell. nun- 
united with Great Britain, lsoi 
, English Pale at the end of the 15th century 





The British Isles during the Middle Ages 

105 



196 



The Middle Ages 



north by the Pyrenees, seems to form another natural political 
unit, yet within the peninsula there are two independent states. 
On the whole, such great mountain ranges as the Alps, Car- 
pathians, and Balkans, and such great rivers as the Rhine, 

Danube, and Vistula, have failed 
to provide permanent frontiers 
for European states. 

It is still more difficult to trace 
racial boundaries in modern 
Europe. Peaceful 
migrations and in- 
vasions, beginning 
in prehistoric times and contin- 
uing to the present, have led to 
much mixture of peoples. Nor 
is every European state one in 
language. France includes the 
district of Brittany, where a 
Celtic speech prevails. Switzer- 
land has French, German, and 
Italian speaking cantons. In 
the British Isles one may still 




Racial and 

linguistic 

boundaries 



Coronation Chair, West- 
minster Abbey 



Every English ruler since Edward I has 
been crowned in this oak chair. Under the 
seat is the "Stone of Scone," said to have hear Welsh, Gaelic (in the High- 
been once used by the patriarch Jacob. l an ds), and Irish. The pOSSeS- 

sion of a common language 



Edward I brought it to London in 1291, as 
a token of the subjection of Scotland. 



undoubtedly tends to bring 
peoples together and keep them together, but it is not an indis- 
pensable condition of their unity. 

History, rather than geography, race, or even language, 
explains the present grouping of European states. When the 

Christian era opened, all the region between the 
State-making r 

North Sea and the Black Sea and from the Mediter- 
ranean to the Rhine and the Danube belonged to the Roman 
Empire. This Romanized Europe made a solid whole, with one 
government, one law, and one language. Five hundred years 
passed, and Europe under the influence of the Germanic inva- 
sions began to split up into a number of separate, independent 



National States during the Later Middle Ages 197 

states. The process of state-making continued throughout the 
Middle Ages, as the result of renewed invasions (principally 
those of the Northmen, Slavs, Arabs, Bulgarians, Magyars, 
Mongols, and Turks). The three strongest states in Europe at 
the end of the medieval period were England, France, and Spain. 

The dominions which William the Conqueror and his Nor- 
man knights won by the sword in 1066 included neither Wales, 
Scotland, nor Ireland. Their inhabitants (except Expansion 
in the Scottish Lowlands) were Celtic-speaking of England 
peoples, whom the Anglo-Saxon invaders of England never 
attempted to subdue. It was almost inevitable, however, that 
in process of time the British Isles should come under a single 
government. Unification began with the conquest of Wales 
by Edward I, near the close of the thirteenth century. He also 
annexed Scotland, but his weakling son, whom the Scots had 
defeated in the battle of Bannockburn, abandoned all claims to 
the country. It remained independent for the remainder of the 
medieval period. The English first entered Ireland in the second 
half of the twelfth century, but for a long time held only a small 
district about Dublin, known as the Pale. Ireland by its situa- 
tion could scarcely fail to become an appanage of Great Britain, 
but the dividing sea has combined with differences in race, 
language, and religion, and with English misgovernrhent, to 
prevent anything like a genuine union of the conquerors and 
the conquered. 

Nature seems to have intended that France should play a 
leading part in European affairs. The geographical unity of the 
country is obvious. Mountains and seas form its physical 
permanent boundaries, except on the northeast, France 
where the frontier is not well defined. The western coast of 
France opens on the Atlantic, now the greatest highway of 
the world's commerce, while on the southeast France touches 
the Mediterranean, the home of classical civilization. This 
intermediate position between two seas helps us to understand 
why French history should form, as it were, a connecting link 
between ancient and modern times. 

But the greatness of France has been due, in addition, to the 



198 



The Middle Ages 




Unification of France during the Middle Ages 



qualities of the French people. Many racial elements have con- 
tributed to the population. The blood of prehistoric men, 
Racial whose monuments and grave mounds are scattered 

France over t h e i anc [, still flows in the veins of Frenchmen. 

At the opening of historic times France was chiefly occupied 
by the Gauls, whom Julius Caesar found there and subdued. 
The Gauls, a Celtic-speaking people, formed in later ages the 
main stock of the French nation, but their language gave place 



National States during the Later Middle Ages 199 

to Latin after the Roman conquest. In the course of five 
hundred years the Gauls were so thoroughly Romanized that 
they may best be described as Gallo-Romans. The Burgundians, 
Franks, and Northmen afterward added a Teutonic element to 
the population, as well as some infusion of Teutonic laws and 
customs. 

France, again, became a great nation because of the greatness 
of her rulers. The old line of French kings, descended from 
Charlemagne, died out in the tenth century, and. a The Cape- 
nobleman named Hugh Capet then founded a new han d y nast y 
dynasty. His accession took place in 987. The Capetian 
dynasty was long-lived, and for more than three centuries son 
followed father on the throne without a break in the succession. 
During this time the French sovereigns worked steadily to unite 
the feudal states of medieval France into a real nation under a 
common government. 

Hugh Capet's duchy — the original France — included only a 
small stretch of inland country centering about Paris on the 
Seine and Orleans on the Loire. His election to unification 
the kingship did not increase his power over the ofFrance 
great lords who ruled in Normandy, Brittany, Burgundy, and 
other parts of the country. They did homage to the king for 
their fiefs and performed the usual feudal services, but otherwise 
regarded themselves as independent. The accompanying map 
shows how the French rulers enlarged the royal domain, or 
territory under the king's control, until by the end of the fif- 
teenth century the unification of France was almost complete. 

Spain in historic times was conquered by the Carthaginians, 
who left few traces of their occupation; by the Romans, who 
thoroughly Romanized the country; by the Visi- Unification 
got.hs, who founded a Teutonic kingdom ; and lastly of Spam 
by the Moors, 1 who introduced Arabian culture and the faith 
of Islam. The Moors never wholly overran a fringe of mountain 
territory in the extreme north of the peninsula. Here arose 
several Christian states, including Leon, Castile, Navarre, and 

1 The name Moor (derived from the Roman province of Mauretania) is applied 
to the Arab awl Berber peoples who occupied North Africa and Spain. 



200 



The Middle Ages 



Aragon. They fought steadily to enlarge their boundaries, with 
such success that by the close of the thirteenth century Moorish 
Spain had been reduced to the kingdom of Granada. Mean- 
while, the separate states were coming together, and the mar- 




The dates are those of Christii 
.Conquest of Moorish Territory 



Territory added 
\t beginning of to the end of loth 
12th Century Century (14921 



Aragon Q WM 
Navarre llllll I;:;;?;':;! 
Portugal H 



Unification of Spain during the Middle Ages 

riage of Ferdinand of Aragon to Isabella of Castile completed the 
process. Ferdinand and Isabella captured Granada in 1492, 
thus ending Moorish rule in Spain. No effort was made by the 
Ottoman Turks, who shortly before had taken Constantinople, 
to defend this last stronghold of Islam in the West. 

The complete establishment of feudalism in any country 
meant, as has been shown, 1 its division into numerous small 
Feudalism communities, each with an army, law court, and 
and royalty treasury. A king often became little more than a 
figurehead, equaled or perhaps surpassed in power by some of 
his own vassals. The sovereigns, who saw themselves thus 
stripped of all but the semblance of authority, were naturally 



1 See page 170. 



National States during the Later Middle Ages 201 

anti-feudal, and during the later Middle Ages they began to 
get the upper hand of their nobles. They formed permanent 
armies by insisting that all military service should be rendered 
to themselves and not to the feudal lords. They put down 
private warfare between the nobles and took over the adminis- 
tration of justice. They developed a revenue system, with the 
taxes collected by royal officers and deposited in the royal 
treasury. The sovereigns thus succeeded in creating a unified, 
centralized government, which all their subjects feared, respected, 
and obeyed. 

The triumph of royalty over feudalism was in many ways a 
gain for civilization. Feudalism, though better than no govern- 
ment at all, did not meet the needs of a progressive The new 
society. Only strong-handed kings could keep the monarchies 
peace, punish crime, and foster industry and trade. The kings, of 
course, were generally despotic, repressing not only the privileges 
of the nobles but also popular liberties. Despotism never became 
so pronounced in England as on the Continent, because the Eng- 
lish people during the Middle Ages developed a Parliament to 
represent them and the Common Law to protect them from 
royal oppression. They also compelled various sovereigns to 
issue charters, especially Magna Carta, which was secured 
from King John in 1215. This famous document, among other 
things, provided that henceforth no one might be arrested, im- 
prisoned, or punished in any way, except after a trial by his 
equals and in accordance with the law of the land. Magna 
Carta contained the germ of legal principles upon which English- 
men ever afterward relied for protection against their rulers. 

The new monarchies, by breaking down feudalism, promoted 
the growth of national or patriotic sentiments. Loyalty to the 
sovereign and to the state which he represented The new 
gradually replaced allegiance to the feudal lord, nationalism 
Nobles, clergy, city folk, and peasants began to think of them- 
selves as one people and to have for their "fatherland" the 
warmest feelings of patriotic devotion. This new nationalism 
was especially well developed in England, France, and Spain 
at the close of the Middle Ages. 



202 The Middle Ages 

Studies 

i. What happened in 622? in 732? in 800? in 843? in 962? in 1066? in 1095? in 1215? 
and in 1453? 2. "The Germans had stolen their way into the very citadel of the 
empire long before its distant outworks were stormed." Comment on this statement. 
3. Set forth the conditions which hindered, and those which favored, the fusion of 
Germans and Romans. 4. On an outline map indicate the boundaries of Charle- 
magne's empire, distinguishing his hereditary possessions from those which he ac- 
quired by conquest. 5. Compare the invasions of the Northmen with those of the 
Germans as to (a) causes, (b) area covered, and (c) results. 6. "The real heirs of 
Charlemagne were from the first neither the kings of France nor those of Italy or 
Germany, but the feudal lords." Comment on this statement. 7. Contrast feu- 
dalism as a political system with (a) the classical city-states; (b) the Roman Empire; 
and (c) modern national states. 8. Explain the terms "Greek Empire," "Byzantine 
Empire," and "Roman Empire in the East." 9. Compare the respective areas in 
800 of the Byzantine Empire and the empire of Charlemagne 10. "The Byzan- 
tines were the teachers of the Slavs, as the Romans were of the Germans." Comment 
on this statement. 1 1 . On an outline map indicate the Arabian Empire at its great- 
est extent, together with ten important cities 12. Show that Islam was an heir to 
the Hellenistic civilization of antiquity. 13 "From the eighth to the twelfth cen- 
tury the world knew but two civilizations, that of Byzantium and that of the Arabs '' 
Comment on this statement 14. "Mixture or at least contact of races, is essential 
to progress." How do the crusades illustrate this statement? 15. Were the crusades 
the only means by which western Europe was brought into contact with Arabian 
civilization? 16. What parts of Asia were not included in the Mongol Empire at its 
greatest extent? 17. Why were the invasions of the Mongols and Ottoman Turks 
more destructive to civilization than those of the Germans, the Arabs, and the 
Northmen? 18. " Good government in the Middle Ages was only another name tor 
a public-spirited and powerful monarchy." Comment on this statement 



CHAPTER VI 
MEDIEVAL CIVILIZATION 1 

51. The Church 

The most important civilizing influence in western Europe 

during the Middle Ages was the Roman Church. The Church 

performed a double task. On the one hand, it gave „. „. 
, ,- • , i - , The Church 

the people religious instruction and watched over and medie- 

their morals; on the other hand, it took an impor- ^ civiliza - 

tion 
tant part in secular affairs. Priests and monks 

were almost the only persons of education; consequently, they 

controlled the schools, wrote the books, framed the laws, acted 

as royal ministers, and served as members of the Parliament or 

other national assembly. The Church thus directed the higher 

life of a medieval community. 

The Church held spiritual sway throughout western Europe. 
Italy and Sicily, the larger part of Spain, France, Territorial 
the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Bohemia, extent of 
Hungary, Poland, the British Isles, Denmark, 
Sweden, Norway, and Iceland yielded obedience to the pope of 
Rome. 

Membership in the Church was not a matter of free choice. 
All people, except Jews, were required to belong to it. A 
person joined the Church by baptism, a rite usually The Church 
performed in infancy, and remained in it as long as as universal 
he lived. Every one was expected to conform, at least out- 
wardly, to the doctrines and practices of the Church, and any 
one attacking its authority was liable to punishment as a heretic. 

' Webster, Readings in if "rial and Modern History, chapter iii, "The Bcnedic- 
tine Rule"; chapter x, "Monastic Life in the Twelfth Century"; chapter si, "St. 
Francis and the Franciscans"; chapter xvii, ".Medieval Tales"; chapter xviii, 
"Three Medieval Epics." 



204 Medieval Civilization 

The existence of one Church in the western world furnished a 
bond of union between European peoples. The Church took 
The Church no heed of political boundaries, for men of all 
as inter- nationalities entered the ranks of the priesthood 

and joined the monastic orders. Priests and monks 
were subjects of no country, but were "citizens of heaven," as 
they sometimes called themselves. Even differences of language 
counted for little in the Church, since Latin was the universal 
speech of the educated classes. One must think, then, of the 
Church as a great international state, in form a monarchy, pre- 
sided over by the pope, and with its capital at Rome. 

The Church taught a belief in a personal God, all-wise, all- 
good, all-powerful, to know whom was the highest goal of life. 
. The avenue to this knowledge lay through faith in 

the revelation of God, as found in the Scriptures. 
Since the unaided human reason could not properly interpret 
the Scriptures, it was necessary for the Church, through her 
officers, to declare their meaning. The Church thus appeared as 
the repository of religious knowledge, as the "gate of heaven." 
Salvation did not depend only on the acceptance of certain 
beliefs. There were also certain acts, called "sacraments," in 
which the faithful Christian must participate, if he was not to 
be cut off eternally from God. They formed channels of heavenly 
grace; they saved man from the consequences of his sinful 
nature and filled him with the "fullness of divine life." Bap- 
tism and the Eucharist (Lord's Supper) were the two most 
important sacraments. Since priests alone could administer 
them, the Church presented itself as the necessary mediator 
between God and man. 

As soon as Christianity had triumphed in the Roman Empire, 
thus becoming the religion of the rich and powerful as well as of 
the poor and lowly, more attention was devoted to 
the conduct of worship. Magnificent church build- 
ings were often erected. Their architects seem to have followed 
as models the basilicas, or public halls, which formed so familiar a 
sight in Roman cities. Church interiors were adorned with 
paintings, mosaic pictures, images of saints, and the figure of the 




GROWTH OF CHRISTIANITY 
FROM THE FIFTH TO THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY 

3 Extent of Christianity about 400 A. D. I I Mohammedanism is 

D Area Christianized 400-800 A. D. shown by white bands I 

D Area Christianized 800-1100 A. D, SS SS SS SSl j Division between the 

Greek and Roman Churches 



3 Area Christianized 1100-1300 A. D. 

Boundaries (in 622 A.D) of the patriarchates of Rome, Constantinople, 
Antioch, Jerusalem and Alexandria 



'' 




BtSping - yosti. 



The Church 



205 



cross. Lighted candles on the altars and the burning of fragrant 
incense lent an additional impressiveness to worship. Beautiful 
prayers and hymns were composed. Organs and church bells also 
came into use during the Middle Ages. 

Many cases, which to-day would be decided according to the 
civil or criminal law of the State, in the Middle Ages came 
before ecclesiastical courts. Since marriage was Ecclesiasti- 
considered a sacrament, the Church took upon itself cal courts 
to decide what marriages were lawful. It forbade the union 
of first cousins, of second 
cousins, and of godparents 
and godchildren. It re- 
fused to sanction divorce, 
for whatever cause, if both 
parties at the time of mar- 
riage had been baptized 
Christians. The Church 
dealt with inheritance un- 
der wills, for a man could 
not make a legal will until 
he had confessed, and con- 
fession formed part of the 
sacrament of penance. All 
contracts made binding by 
oaths came under Church 
jurisdiction, because an oath was an appeal to God. The Church 
tried those who were charged with any sin against religion, in- 
cluding heresy, blasphemy, the taking of interest (usury), and 
the practice of witchcraft. Widows, orphans, and the families 
of pilgrims or crusaders also enjoyed the special protection of 
the Church. 

Disobedience to the regulations of the Church might be fol- 
lowed by excommunication. This was a coercive measure which 
cut off the offender from Christian fellowship. He Excommu- 
could neither attend religious services nor enjoy J" ^ 011 
the sacraments so necessary to salvation. If he died excommuni- 
cate, his body could not be buried in consecrated ground. By 




Religious Music 

From a window of the cathedral of Bourges, 
a city in central France. Shows a pipe organ 
and chimes. 



206 Medieval Civilization 

the law of the State he lost all civil rights and forfeited all his 
property. No one might speak to him, feed him, or shelter him. 
Such a terrible penalty, it is well to point out, was usually im- 
posed only after the sinner had received a fair trial and had 
spurned all entreaties to repent. Excommunication still retains 
an important place among the spiritual weapons of the Church. 

We may now consider the attitude of the Church toward the 
social and economic problems of the Middle Ages. In regard 
The Church td private warfare, the prevalence of which formed 
and warfare one f t h e g rea test evils of the time, the Church, 
in general, cast its influence on the side of peace. It forbade 
attacks on all defenseless people, including priests, monks, 
pilgrims, merchants, peasants, and women. It also established 
a "Truce of God," which required all men to cease fighting from 
Wednesday evening to Monday morning of each week, in Lent, 
and on various holy days. The truce would have given western 
Europe peace for about two-thirds of the year, but it was never 
strictly observed, except in limited areas. The feudal lords 
could not be deterred from warring with one another, even 
though they were threatened with the torments of hell. The 
Church did not carry its pacific policy so far as to condemn war- 
fare against heretics and infidels. Christians believed it a 
religious duty to exterminate these enemies of God. 

The Church was distinguished for charitable work. It dis- 
tributed large sums to the needy. It also multiplied hospitals, 
The Church orphanages, and asylums. Medieval charity, how- 
and charity ever, was very often injudicious. The problem of 
removing the causes of poverty seems never to have been 
raised; and the indiscriminate giving multiplied, rather than 
reduced, the number of beggars. 

Neither slavery nor serfdom, into which slavery gradually 
passed, was ever pronounced unlawful by pope or Church coun- 
The Church c ^* The Church condemned slavery only when it 
and slavery was the servitude of a Christian in bondage to 
and serfdom & j ew Qr an infidel _ Abbots, bishops, and popes 

possessed slaves and serfs. The serfs of some wealthy monas- 
teries were counted by thousands. The Church, nevertheless, 



The Clergy 



207 



encouraged the freeing of bondmen as a meritorious act and 
always preached the duty of kindness and forbearance toward 
them. 

The Church also helped to promote the cause of human free- 
dom by insisting on the natural equality of all men in the sight 
of God. "The Creator," wrote one of the popes, Democracy 
"distributes his gifts without regard to social of the Church 
classes. In his eyes there are neither nobles nor serfs." The 
Church gave 
practical expres- 
sion to this atti- 
tude by opening 
the priesthood 
and monastic or- 
ders to every one, 
whether high- 
born or low-born, 
whether rich or 
poor. Naturally 
enough, the 
Church attracted 
to its service the 
keenest minds of 
the age. 




52. The Clergy 



A Bishop Ordaining a Priest 



From an English manuscript of the twelfth century. The 
bishop wears a miter and holds in his left hand the pastoral 
staff, or crosier. His right hand is extended in blessing over 
the priest's head. 



Some one has 
said that in the 
Mi' k lie Ages there 
were just three classes of society: the nobles who fought; the 
peasants who worked; and the clergy who prayed. Parish 
An account of the clergy naturally begins with the P nests 
parish priest, who had charge of a parish, the smallest division 
of Christendom. He was the only Church officer who came 
continually into touch with the common people. He baptized, 
married, and buried his parishioners. He celebrated mass at 
least once a week, heard confessions, and imposed penance. He 



208 Medieval Civilization 

watched over all their deeds on earth and prepared them for the 
life to come. 

A group of parishes formed a diocese, over which a bishop 
presided. It was his business to look after the property belonging 
Bishops and to the diocese, to hold the ecclesiastical courts, to 
archbishops v j s ^ ^g clergy, and to see that they did their duty. 
Since the Church held many estates on feudal tenure, the 
bishop was usually a territorial lord, owing a vassal's obligations 
to the king or to some powerful noble for his land, and himself 
ruling over vassals in different parts of the country. As symbols 
of his power and dignity, the bishop wore on his head the miter 
and carried the pastoral staff, or crosier. Above the bishop stood 
the archbishop. In England, for example, there were two arch- 
bishops, one residing at York and the other at Canterbury. 
The latter, as "Primate of All England," was the highest ecclesi- 
astical dignitary in the country. A church which contained the 
official throne * of a bishop or archbishop was called a cathedral. 
It was ordinarily the largest and most magnificent church in the 
diocese. 

The earlier monks were hermits. They devoted themselves, 
as they believed, to the service of God, by retiring to the desert 
for prayer, meditation, and bodily mortification. 
A life shut off from all contact with one's fellows 
is difficult and beyond the strength of ordinary men. The 
mere human need for social intercourse gradually brought the 
hermits together, at first in small groups and then in larger 
communities, or monasteries. The next step was to give the 
scattered monasteries a common organization and government. 
Those in western Christendom gradually adopted the regulations 
which St. Benedict (about 529) drew up for the guidance of 
his monastery at Monte Cassino in Italy. 

The monks obeying the Benedictine Rule formed a corpora- 
tion, presided over by an abbot, 2 who held office for life. Every 
The Bene- candidate for admission took the vow of obedience 
dictineRule to ^ e aD bot. Any man, rich or poor, noble or 
peasant, might enter the monastery after a year's probation; 

1 Latin cathedra. 2 From a Syrian word, abba, meaning "father." 



The Clergy 



209 



having once joined, however, he must remain a monk for the 
rest of his days. The monks lived under strict discipline. 
They could not own any property; they could not go beyond 
the monastery walls without the abbot's consent; and they 




Abbey of Saint-Germain des Pres, Paris 

This celebrated monastery was founded in the sixth century. Of the original 
buildings only the abbey church remains. The illustration shows the monastery as it 
was in 1.561, with walls, towers, drawbridge, and moat. Adjoining the church were the 
cloister, the refectory, and the dormitory. 

followed a regular round of worship, reading from the Bible, 
private prayer, and meditation. For most of the day, however, 
they worked hard with their hands, doing the necessary washing 
and cooking for the monastery, raising the necessary supplies of 
vegetables and grain, and performing all the other tasks required 
to maintain a large establishment. This emphasis on labor, as 
a religious duty, was a characteristic feature of western monas- 
ticism. "To labor is to pray" became its motto. 



210 Medieval Civilization 

The civilizing influence of the Benedictine monks during the 
early Middle Ages can scarcely be over-emphasized. A monas- 
The monks tery was often at once a model farm, an inn, a hos- 
as civilizers pital, a school, and a library. By the careful 
cultivation of their lands the monks set an example of good 
farming wherever they settled. They entertained pilgrims and 
travelers at a period when western Europe was almost destitute 
of inns. They performed many works of charity, feeding the 
hungry, healing the sick who were brought to their doors, and 
distributing their medicines freely to those who needed them. 
In their schools they trained both boys who wished to become 
priests, and those who intended to lead active lives in the 
world. The monks, too, were the only scholars of the age. By 
copying the manuscripts of classical authors, they preserved 
valuable books that would otherwise have been lost. By keeping 
records of the most striking events of their time, they acted 
as chroniclers of medieval history. To all these services must 
be added the work of the monks as missionaries among the 
heathen. 

Yet even the Benedictine system had its limitations. The 
monks lived apart from their fellow-men and sought chiefly the 

salvation of their own souls. A new conception of 
The friars - . ,.. ..... . 

the religious life arose early in the thirteenth cen- 
tury, with the coming of the friars. 1 Their aim was social 
service. They devoted themselves to the salvation of others. 
The foundation of the orders of friars was the work of two men, 
St. Francis in Italy and St. Dominic in Spain. The Franciscans 
and Dominicans resembled each other in many ways. They 
went on foot from place to place, and wore coarse robes tied 
round the waist with a rope. They possessed no property, but 
lived on the alms of the charitable. They were also preachers, 
who spoke to the people, not in Latin, but in the common 
language of each country which they visited. The Franciscans 
worked especially in the slums of the cities; the Dominicans 
addressed themselves rather to educated people and the upper 
classes. As time went on, both orders relaxed the rule of poverty 

1 Latin frater, "brother." 



The Papacy 



211 



and became very wealthy. They still survive, scattered all 
over the world and engaged chiefly in teaching and missionary 
activity. 

The friars by their preaching and ministrations did a great 
deal to call forth a religious revival in Europe during the thir- 
teenth century. In particular, they helped to The friars 
strengthen the papal authority. Both orders re- and the 
ceived the sanction of the pope; both enjoyed papacy 
many privileges at his hands; and both looked to him for direc- 
tion. The pope employed them to 
raise money, to preach crusades, 
and to impose excommunications. 
The Franciscans and Dominicans 
formed, in fact, the agents of the 
Papacy. 

53. The Papacy i. . lU 



The claim of the Roman bishops 
to spiritual supremacy over the 
Christian world had a The Petrine 
double basis. Certain supremacy 
passages in the New Testament, 
where St. Peter is represented as the 
rock on which the Church is built 




Papal Arms 

According to the well-known pas- 
sage in Matthew (xvi, 19), Christ 
gave to St. Peter the "keys of the 



and the doorkeeper of the kingdom kin « d ° m of heaven," with the power 

, "to bind and to loose." These keys 

Of heaven, appear tO indicate that are always represented in the papal 

he was regarded by Christ as the arms - t°g ether with the tia *a °* head- 

' dress, worn by the popes on certain 

chief of the Apostles. Furthermore, occasions. 
a well-established tradition made 

St. Peter the founder of the Roman Church and its first bishop. 
It was then argued that he passed to his successors, the popes, 
all his rights and dignity. As St. Peter was the first among 
the Apostles, so the popes were to be the first among bishops. 
Such was the doctrine of the Petrine supremacy, expressed 
as far back as the second century, strongly asserted by many 
popes during the Middle Ages, and maintained to-day by the 
Roman Church. 



212 Medieval Civilization 

The name "pope" x seems at first to have been applied to all 

priests as a title of respect and affection. The Greek Church 

•pi,- „«„»>«, still continues this use of the word. In the West it 
Ine pope s 

exalted gradually came to be reserved to the bishop of 

posi on Rome as his official title. The pope was addressed 

in speaking as "Your Holiness." His exalted position was 
further indicated by the tiara, or headdress with triple crowns, 
worn by him in processions. He went to solemn ceremonies 
sitting in a chair supported on the shoulders of his guard. He 
gave audience from an elevated throne, and all who approached 
him kissed his feet in reverence. 

The pope was the supreme lawgiver of the Church. His 
decrees might not be set aside by any other person. He made 
The pope's new laws in the form of "bulls" 2 and by his "dis- 
authority pensations" could in particular cases set aside old 

laws, such as those forbidding cousins to marry or monks to 
obtain release from their vows. The pope was also the supreme 
judge of the Church, for all appeals from the lower ecclesiastical 
courts came before him for decision. Finally, the pope was the 
supreme administrator of the Church. He confirmed the elec- 
tion of bishops, deposed them, when necessary, or transferred 
them from one diocese to another. The pope also exercised 
control over the monastic orders and called general councils 
of the Church. 

The authority of the pope was commonly exercised by the 
"legates," 3 whom he sent out as his representatives at the 
The papal various European courts. These officers kept the 
legates pope in close touch with the condition of the Church 

in every part of western Europe. A similar function is per- 
formed in modern times by the papal ambassadors known as 
"nuncios." 

For assistance in government the pope made use of the car- 
dinals, 4 who formed a board, or "college." At first they were 

1 Latin papa, "father." 

2 So called from the lead seal (Latin bulla) attached to papal documents. 
3 Latin legalus, "deputy." 

4 Latin cardinalis, "principal." 




Exterior 




Interior 
ST. PETER'S, ROME 

St. Peter's, begun in 1506 A.D., was completed in 1667, according to the designs of Bra- 
mante, Raphael, Michelangelo, and other celebrated architects. It is the largest church in 
the world. The central aisle, nave, and choir measure about 600 feet in length; the great 
dome, 140 feet in diameter, rises to a height of more than 400 feet. A double colonnade en- 
circles the piazza in front of the church. The Vatican is seen to the right of St. Peter's. 



The Papacy 2 1 3 

chosen only from the clergy of Rome and the vicinity, but 

in course of time the pope opened the cardinalate to prominent 

churchmen in all countries. The number of car- _ .. , 

Cardinals 

dinals is now fixed at seventy, but the college is 
never full, and there are always several "vacant hats," as the 
saying goes. The cardinals, in the eleventh century, received 
the right of choosing a new pope. A cardinal's dignity is indi- 
cated by the red hat and scarlet robe which he wears and by the 
title of "Eminence" applied to him. 

The pope was a temporal sovereign, ruling over Rome and the 
States of the Church. These possessions included during the 
Middle Ages the greater part of central Italy, states of 
The pope did not lose them altogether until the the Church 
formation of the present Italian Kingdom, in the second half 
of the nineteenth century. 

To support the business of the Papacy and to maintain the 
splendor of the papal court required a large annual income. This 
came partly from the States of the Church, partly income of 
from the gifts of the faithful, and partly from the the PaDac y 
payments made by the abbots, bishops, and archbishops when 
the pope confirmed their election to office. Still another source 
of revenue consisted of "Peter's pence," a tax of a penny on 
each hearth. It was collected every year in England and in 
some Continental countries until the time of the Reformation. 
The modern "Peter's pence" is a voluntary contribution made 
each year by Roman Catholics in all parts of the world. 

Rome, the Eternal City, from which in ancient times the 
known world had been ruled, formed in the Middle Ages the 
capital of the Papacy. Few traces now remain of The capital 
the medieval city. Old St. Peter's Church, where of the Papacy 
Charlemagne was crowned emperor, gave way in the sixteenth 
century to the world-famous structure" that now occupies its 
site. The Lateran Palace, which for more than a thousand 
years served as the residence of the popes, has also disappeared, 
its place being taken by a new and smaller building. The 
popes now live in the splendid palace of the Vatican, adjoin- 
ing St. Peter's. ^- — 



214 



Medieval Civilization 
54. Country Life 



Civilization has always had its home in the city. Nothing 
marks more strongly the backwardness of the early Middle Ages 
Decline of than the absence of the flourishing cities which 
urban life ^j filled western Europe under the Roman Em- 
pire. 1 The Teutonic invasions led to a gradual decay of manu- 
facturing and commerce and hence of the cities in which those 
activities centered. As urban life declined, the mass of the 




-ft«U^"^** — 



.,,:':-,,„,; 



Sulgrave Manor 

Sulgrave, in Northhamptonshire, was the ancestral home of the Washington family. 
The manor house, built by Lawrence Washington about the middle of the sixteenth 
century, bears the family coat-of-arms on the porch. This historic dwelling has been 
purchased by an English committee for preservation as a memorial of the friendship 
and blood-relationship between England and the United States. 



population came to live more and more in isolated rural com- 
munities. This was the great economic feature of the early 
Middle Ages. 

An estate in land, when owned by a lord and occupied by 
dependent peasants, was called a manor. 2 It naturally varied in 
size according to the wealth of its lord. Every 
noble had at least one manor; great nobles might 
have several manors, usually scattered throughout the country; 



The manor 



1 See page 141. 

2 From the Old French manoir, 



'mansion" (Latin manere, "to dwell"). 



Country Life 



215 



and even the king depended upon his many manors for the food 
supply of the court. England, during the period following the 
Norman Conquest, contained more than nine thousand of these 
manorial estates. 




Plan of Hitchin Manor, Hertfordshire 

Lord's demesne, diagonal lines. 
Meadow and pasture lands, dotted areas. 
Normal holding of a peasant, black strips. 



The lord reserved for his own use a part of the arable land of 

the manor. This was his "demesne," or domain. The rest of 

the land he allotted to the peasants who were his „ 

r . Common cul- 

tenants. They cultivated their holdings in com- tivation of 
mon, according to the "open-field" system. A the arable 
fanner, instead of having his land in one compact 
mass, had it split up into a large number of small strips 
(usually an acre or a half-acre) scattered over the manor, and 
separated, not by fences or hedges, but by banks of unplowed 
turf. The appearance of a manor, when under cultivation, has 



216 Medieval Civilization 

been likened to a vast checkerboard or a patchwork quilt. 
The reason for the intermixture of strips seems to have been 
to make sure that each farmer had a portion both of the good 
land and of the bad. It is obvious that this arrangement com- 
pelled all the peasants to labor according to a common plan. 
A man had to sow the same kinds of crops as his neighbors, and 
to till and reap them at the same time. Agriculture, under such 
circumstances, could not fail to be unprogressive. 

Farmers did not know how to enrich the soil by the use of 
fertilizers and a proper rotation of crops. Consequently, they 
Farming divided all the arable land into three parts, one of 

methods which was sown with wheat or rye, and another 

with oats or barley, while the third was allowed to lie fallow 
(uncultivated) for a year, so that it might recover its fertility. 
Eight or nine bushels of grain represented the average yield of 
an acre. Farm animals were small, for scientific breeding had 
not yet begun. Farm implements, also, were few and clumsy. 
It took five men a day to reap and bind the harvest of two acres. 

Besides his holding of arable land, which in England averaged 

about thirty acres, each peasant had certain rights over the 

r rtmm ™ „co non-arable land of the manor. He could cut a 
Common use 

of the non- limited amount of hay from the meadow. He could 
an ^ um sQ man y f arm animals — cattle, geese, swine — - 
on the waste. He also enjoyed the privilege of taking so much 
wood from the forest for fuel and building purposes. A peasant's 
holding, which also included a house in the village, thus formed 
a complete outfit. 

The peasants on a manor lived close together in one or more 
villages. Their small, thatch-roofed, and one-roomed houses 
Description were grouped about an open space (the "green"), 
of a village or on ^q^ s [^ es f a single, narrow street. The 
only important buildings were the parish church, the parsonage, 
a mill, if a stream ran through the manor, and possibly a black- 
smith's shop. The population of one of these communities 
often did not exceed one hundred souls. 

A village in the Middle Ages had a regular staff of officials. 
First came the headman or reeve, who represented the peasants 



Country Life 217 

in their dealings with the lord of the manor. Next came the 
constable or beadle, whose duty it was to carry messages around 
the village, summon the inhabitants to meetings, village 
and enforce the orders of the reeve. Then there officials 
were the pound-keeper, who seized straying animals; the watch- 
man, who guarded the flocks at night; and the village carpenter, 
blacksmith, and miller. These officials, in return for their ser- 
vices, received an allowance of land, which the villagers culti- 
vated for them. 

Perhaps the most striking feature of a medieval village was 
its self-sufficiency. The inhabitants tried to produce at home 
everything they required, in order to avoid the a village as 
uncertainty and expense of trade. The land gave self-sufficing 
them their food; the forest provided them with wood for houses 
and furniture. They made their own clothes of flax, wool, and 
leather. Their meal and flour were ground at the village mill, 
and at the village smithy their farm implements were manufac- 
tured. The chief articles which needed to be brought from 
some distant market included salt, used to salt down farm 
animals killed in autumn, iron for various tools, and millstones. 
Cattle, horses, and surplus grain also formed common objects 
of exchange between manors. 

Life in a medieval village was rude and rough. The peasants 
labored from sunrise to sunset, ate coarse fare, lived in huts, and 
suffered from frequent pestilences. They were Hard lot of 
often the helpless prey of the feudal nobles. If the peasants 
their lord happened to be a quarrelsome man, given to fighting 
with his neighbors, they might see their land ravaged, their 
cattle driven off, and their village burned, and might them- 
selves be slain. Even under peaceful conditions the narrow, shut- 
in life of the manor could not be otherwise than degrading. 

Yet there is another side to the picture. If the peasants had 
a just and generous lord, they probably led a fairly comfortable 
existence. Except when crops failed, they had an Alleviations 
abundance of food, and possibly wine or cider to of the peas- 
drink. They shared a common life in the work of 
the fields, in the sports of the village green, and in the services 







Farm Work in the Fourteenth Century 

Plowing. Harrowing. Cutting Weeds. Reaping. 

2l8 



Serfdom 219 

of the parish church. They enjoyed many holidays; it has 
been estimated that, besides Sundays, about eight weeks in 
every year were free from work. Festivities at Christmas, 
Easter, and May Day, at the end of ploughing and the com- 
pletion of harvest, also relieved the monotony of labor. 

55. Serfdom 

A medieval village usually contained several classes of labor- 
ers. There might be a number of freemen, who paid a fixed 
rent, either in money or produce, for the use of Freeman 
their land. A few slaves might also be found in the slaves, and 
lord's household or at work on his demesne. By 
this time, however, slavery had about died out in western 
Europe. Most of the peasants were serfs. 

A slave belonged to his master; he was bought and sold like 
other chattels. A serf had a higher position, for he could not be 
sold apart from the land nor could his holding be Nature of 
taken from him. He was fixed to the soil. On serfdom 
the other hand, a serf ranked lower than a freeman, because 
he could not change his abode, nor marry outside the manor, 
nor bequeath his goods, without the permission of his lord. 

The serf did not receive his land as a gift; for the use of it 
he owed certain duties to his master. These took chiefly the 
form of personal services. He must labor on the Obligations 
• lord's demesne for two or three days each week, of the serf 
and at specially busy seasons, such as ploughing and harvesting. 
he must do extra work. At least half his time was usually 
demanded by the lord. The serf had also to make certain pay- 
ments, either in money or more often in grain, honey, eggs, or 
other produce. When he ground the wheat or pressed the 
grapes which grew on his land, he must use the lord's mill or 
the lord's wine-press, and pay the customary charge. 

Serfdom developed during the later centuries of the Roman 
Empire and in the early Middle Ages. Many serfs seem to have 
been descendants of the tenants, both free and origin of 
servile, who had worked the great Roman estates serfdom 
in western Europe. The serf class was also recruited from the 



2 20 



Medieval Civilization 



n 



z 



ranks of free Germans, whom the disturbed conditions of the 
time induced to seek the protection of a lord. 

Serfdom, being a system of forced labor, was not very profita- 
ble to the lord, and it was irksome to his dependents. After 
Decline of the revival of trade and industry in the twelfth 
serfdom an( j thirteenth centuries had brought more money 

into circulation, the lord discovered how much better it was 

to hire men to work for him, instead 
of depending on serfs who shirked 
their tasks as far as possible. The 
latter, in turn, were glad to pay the 
lord a fixed sum (rent) for the use of 
the land, since now they could devote 
themselves entirely to its cultivation. 
[ i^A/At-Y (II Both parties gained by an arrange- 
ment which converted the manorial 
lord into a landlord and the serf into 
Jl -T—rp^ A\ \)\\\ a free tenant-farmer. 

The emancipation of the peasantry 
was hastened, strangely enough, as 
The Black the result of perhaps the 
Death most terrible calamity 

that has ever afflicted mankind. 
About the middle of the fourteenth 
century a pestilence of Asiatic origin, now known to have been 
the bubonic plague, reached the West. The Black Death, so 
called because among its symptoms were dark patches all over 
the body, moved steadily across Europe. The way for its 
ravages had been prepared by the unhealthful conditions of 
ventilation and drainage in villages and towns. After attacking 
Greece, Sicily, Italy, Spain, France, and Germany, the plague 
entered England in 1349, and within less than two years swept 
away probably half the population. 

The pestilence in England, as in other countries, caused a great 
scarcity of labor. For want of hands to bring in the harvest, 
crops rotted on the ground, while sheep and cattle, with no one 
to care for them, strayed through the deserted fields. The free 




Serf Warming his 
Hands 

After a medieval manuscript. 



City Life 221 

peasants who survived demanded and received higher wages. 
Even the serfs, whose labor was now more valued, found them- 
selves in a better position. The lord of a manor, Effects of the 
in order to keep his laborers, would often allow Black Death 
them to substitute money payments for personal services. 
When the serfs secured no concessions, they frequently took 
to flight and hired themselves to the highest bidder. All this 
went on in spite of numerous statutes passed by Parliament 
ordering workmen to accept the old rate of wages and forbidding 
them to migrate in search of better employment. 

The emancipation of the peasantry continued throughout 
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Serfdom by 1500 had 
virtually disappeared in Italy, in parts of France Extinction 
and Germany, and in England. Some less favored of serfdom 
countries retained serfdom much longer. Prussian, Austrian, 
and Russian serfs did not secure freedom until the nineteenth 
century. 

56. City Life 

The great economic feature of the later Middle Ages was the 
growth of cities. Developing trade, commerce, and manufac- 
tures led to the increase of wealth, the growth of The civic 
markets, and the substitution of money payments revival 
for those in produce or services. Flourishing cities arose, as in 
the days of the Roman Empire, freed themselves from the 
control of the nobles, and became the homes of liberty and 
democracy. 

A number of medieval cities stood on the sites, and even 
within the walls, of Roman municipalities. Particularly in 
Italy, southern France, and Spain, and also in 
the Rhine and Danube regions, it seems that some u!!^!„ „,„- 

» Roman origin 

ancient cities had never been entirely destroyed 
during the Teutonic invasions. They preserved their Roman 
names, their streets, aqueducts, amphitheaters, and churches, 
and possibly vestiges of their Roman institutions. Among 
them were such important centers as Milan, Florence, Venice, 
Lyons, Marseilles, Paris, Vienna, Cologne, London, and York. 



222 Medieval Civilization 

Many medieval cities were new foundations. Some began as 
small communities which increased in size because of exceptional 
Origin of advantages of situation. A place where a river 

other cities could be forded, where two roads met, or where 
a good harbor existed, would naturally become the resort of 
traders. Some, again, started as fortresses, behind whose ram- 
parts the peasants took refuge when danger threatened. A 
third group of cities developed from villages on the manors. A 
thriving settlement was pretty sure to spring up near a monas- 
tery or castle, which offered both protection and employment to 
the common people. 

The city at first formed part of the feudal system. It arose 
upon the territory of a lord and owed obedience to him. The 
The city and citizens ranked not much higher than serfs, though 
feudalism ^gy were traders and artisans instead of farmers. 
They enjoyed no political rights, for their lord collected the 
taxes, appointed officials, kept order, and punished offenders. 
In short, the city was not free. As its inhabitants became more 
numerous and wealthy, they refused to submit, to oppression. 
Sometimes they won their freedom by hard fighting; more often 
they purchased it, perhaps from some noble who needed money 
to go on a crusade. In France, England, and Spain, where the 
royal power was strong, the cities only obtained exemption 
from their feudal burdens. In Germany and Italy, on the other 
hand, the weakness of the central government permitted many 
cities to secure complete independence. One of them survives 
to this day as the little Italian republic of San Marino, and 
three others — Hamburg, Bremen, and Lubeck — entered the 
German Empire in the nineteenth century as separate common- 
wealths. 

The free city had no room for either slaves or serfs. All ser- 
vile conditions ceased inside its walls. The rule prevailed that 
Rise of the any one who had lived in a city for the term of a 
middle class y ear an( j a ^ay cou ld no longer be claimed by a lord 
as his serf. This rule found expression in the famous saying, 
"Town air renders free." The freedom of the cities naturally 
attracted many immigrants to them. There came into existence 



City Life 



223 



a middle class of city people, between the clergy and nobles on 
the one side and the peasants on the other side — what the 
French call the bourgeoisie. 1 Henceforth the middle class, or 
bourgeoisie, distinguished as it was for wealth, intelligence, and 
enterprise, exerted an ever greater influence on European affairs. 





1 












iTTv^r^ , J-/;;;^>^ 



! ~tyjtow 







House of Jacques Cceur, Bourges 

Built in the hitter part of the fifteenth century by a very wealthy French merchant. It is 
an admirable example of Gothic domestic architecture. 

The visitor approaching a medieval city through miles of 
open fields saw it clear in the sunlight, unobscured by coal 
smoke. It looked like a fortress from without, a city from 
with walls, towers, gateways, drawbridges, and wlthout 
moat. Beyond the fortifications he would see, huddled to- 
gether against the sky, the spires of the churches and the 
cathedral, the roofs of the larger houses, and the dark, frown- 
ing mass of the castle. The general impression was one of 
wealth and strength and beauty. 

1 From French bourg, "town." 



224 



Medieval Civilization 



The visitor would not find things so attractive within the 
walls. The streets were narrow, crooked, and ill-paved, dark 
A city from during the day because of the overhanging houses, 
within an( } w ithout illumination at night. There were no 

open spaces or parks except a small market-place. The whole 

city was cramped by 
its walls, which shut 
out light, air, and 
view, and prevented 
expansion into the 
neighboring country. 
Medieval London, for 
instance, covered an 
area of less than one 
square mile. 

A city in the Middle 
Ages lacked sanitary 
Unsanitary ar range- 
conditions ments. The 

only water supply 
came from polluted 
streams and wells. 
Sewers and sidewalks 
were quite unknown. 

" Belery~oe Bruges Peo P le P iled U P their 

Bruges, the capital of West Flanders, contains many refuse in the backyard 

fine monuments of the Middle Ages. Among these is the or flung it into the 

belfry, which rises in the center of the facade of the market - 

hall. It dates from the end of the thirteenth century. Street, tO be deVOUr- 

Its height is 352 feet. The belfry consists of three stories, e( J J-jy £he dogS and 

the two lower ones square, and the upper one, octagonal. . i • 1 j 

pigs which served as 
scavengers. The holes in the pavement collected all man- 
ner of filth, and the unpaved lanes, in wet weather, became 
quagmires. The living were crowded together in many-storied 
houses, airless and gloomy; the dead were buried close at 
hand in crowded churchyards. Such unsanitary conditions 
must have been responsible for much of the sickness that was 
prevalent. The high death rate could only be offset by a birth 




Civic Industry 225 

rate correspondingly high, and by the constant influx of country 
people. 

The inhabitants of the city took a just pride in their public 
buildings. The market-place, where traders assembled, often 
contained a beautiful cross and sometimes a market Public 
hall to shelter goods from the weather. Not far buildings 
away rose the city hall for the transaction of public business 
and the holding of civic feasts. The hall might be crowned by a 
high belfry with an alarm bell to summon the citizens to mass 
meetings. There were also a number of churches and abbeys 
and, if the city was the capital of a bishop's diocese, an imposing 
cathedral. 

The small size of medieval cities — few included as many as 
ten thousand inhabitants — simplified the problem of governing 
them. The leading merchants usually formed a Municipal 
council presided over by a head magistrate, the government 
burgomaster 1 or mayor, 2 who was assisted by aldermen. 3 
In some places the guilds chose the officials and manged civic 
affairs. These associations had many functions and held a 
most important place in city life. It will be necessary, therefore, 
to describe them in some detail. 

57. Civic Industry 

The Anglo-Saxon word "guild," which means "to pay," 
came to be applied to a club or society whose members made 
contributions for some common purpose. This 
form of association is very old. Some of the guilds 
of imperial Rome had been established in the age of the kings, 
while not a few of those which flourish to-day in China and 
India were founded before the Christian era. Guilds existed in 
Continental Europe as early as the time of Charlemagne, but 
they did not become prominent until after the crusades. 

A guild of merchants grew up when those who bought and 
sold goods in any place united to protect their own interests. 

1 German burgermeisler, fn>m burg, "castle." 

2 French mairr, from Latin major, "greater." 
'Anglo-Saxon caldormati {add means "old"). 



226 



Medieval Civilization 



The membership included many artisans, as well as profes- 

Merchant sional traders, for in medieval times a man might 

guilds se r{ j n th e f ron t room of his shop the goods which 

he and his assistants made in the back rooms. 

The chief duty of a 

merchant guild was to 

Commercial preserve to 
monopoly its Qwn mem _ 

bers the monopoly of 
trade within a town. 
Strangers and non- 
guildsmen could not buy 
or sell there except un- 
der conditions imposed 
by the guild. They must 
pay the town tolls, con- 
fine their dealings to 
guildsmen, and as a rule 
sell only at wholesale. 
They were forbidden to 
purchase wares which 
the townspeople wanted 
for themselves, or to set 
up shops for retail trade. 
They enjoyed more free- 
dom at the numerous 
fairs, which were intended to attract outsiders. 

After a time the traders and artisans engaged in a particular 
occupation began to form associations of their own. Thus 
arose the craft guilds, composed of weavers, shoe- 
makers, bakers, tailors, carpenters, and so on, until 
almost every form of industry had its separate organization. 
The names of the various occupations came to be used as the 
surnames of those engaged in them, so that to-day we have such 
common family names as Smith, Cooper, Fuller, Potter, Chand- 
ler, and many others. The number of craft guilds in an impor- 
tant city might be very large. London and Paris at one time 




A German Merchant in the 
Fourteenth Century 

After a miniature in an illuminated manuscript. 



Craft guilds 



Civic Industry 227 

each had more than one hundred, and Cologne in Germany 
had as many as eighty. The members of a particular guild 
usually lived in the same street or quarter of the city, not only 
for companionship, but also for better supervision of their labor. 

Just as the merchant guilds regulated town trade, so the 
craft guilds had charge of town industry. No one could engage 
in any craft without becoming a member of the industrial 
guild which controlled it and submitting to the monopoly 
guild regulations. A man's hours of labor and the prices at 
which he sold his goods were fixed for him by the guild. He 
might not work elsewhere than in his shop, because of the 
difficulty of supervising him, nor might he work by artificial 
light, lest he turn out badly finished goods. Everything made 
by him was carefully inspected to see if it contained shoddy 
materials or showed poor workmanship. Failure to meet the 
test meant a heavy fine or perhaps expulsion from the guild. 
The industrial monopoly possessed by the craft guild thus gave 
some protection to both producer and consumer. 

Full membership in a guild was reached only by degrees. A 
boy started as an apprentice, that is, a learner. He paid a sum 
of money to his master and agreed to serve him organization 
for a fixed period, usually seven years. The of craft 
master, in turn, promised to provide the apprentice 
with food, lodging, and clothing, and to teach him all the 
secrets of the craft. At the end of his period of service the appren- 
tice had to pass an examination by the guild. If he was found fit, 
he then became a journeyman and worked for daily wages. As 
soon as he had saved enough money, he might set up as a master 
in his own shop. A master was at once workman and employer, 
laborer and capitalist. 

The guilds had their charitable and religious aspects. Each 
one raised large benefit funds for the relief of members or their 
widows and orphans. Each one had its private Activities 
altar in the cathedral, or often its own chapel, of craft 
where masses were said for the repose of the souls 
of deceased members, and where on the day of its patron saint 
religious services were held. The guild was also a social organiza- 



228 Medieval Civilization 

tion, with frequent meetings for a feast in its hall or in some inn. 
The guilds in some cities entertained the people with an annual 
play or procession. It is clear that the members of a craft guild 
had common interests and shared a common life. 

As the craft guilds prospered and increased in wealth, they 
tended to become exclusive organizations. Membership fees 
Dissolution were ra *i se( l so high that few could afford to pay 
of craft them, while the number of apprentices that a 

gul s master might take was strictly limited. It also 

became increasingly difficult for journeymen to rise to the sta- 
tion of masters; they often remained wage-earners for life. 
The mass of workmen could no longer participate in the bene- 
fits of the guild system. In the eighteenth century most of the 
guilds lost their monopoly of industry, and in the nineteenth 
century they gave way to trade unions. 

58. Civic Trade 

Nearly every town of any consequence had a weekly or semi- 
weekly market, which was held in the market-place or in the 
churchyard. Marketing often occurred on Sunday. 
Outsiders who brought cattle and produce for sale 
in the market were required to pay tolls, either to the town 
authorities or -sometimes to a neighboring nobleman. These 
market dues survive in the octroi collected at the gates of some 
European cities. 

People in the Middle Ages did not believe in unrestricted com- 
petition. It was thought wrong for any one to purchase goods 

outside of the regular market ("forestalling") or 
"Just price" , P . .\. A , 

to purchase them in larger quantities than necessary 

("engrossing"). A man ought not to charge for a thing more 

than it was worth, or to buy a thing cheap and sell it dear. 

The idea prevailed that goods should be sold at their "just 

price," which was not determined by supply and demand, but 

by an estimate of the cost of the materials and the labor that 

went into their manufacture. Laws were often passed fixing this 

"just price," but it was as difficult then as now to prevent the 

"cornering of the market" by shrewd and unscrupulous traders. 



Civic Trade 



229 




Many towns also held fairs once or twice a year. The fairs 
often lasted for a month or more. They were especially necessary 
in medieval Europe, because merchants did not . 
keep large quantities or many kinds of goods on 
their shelves, nor could intending purchasers afford to travel 
far in search of what they wanted. 
A fair at an English town, such as 
Stourbridge, Winchester, or St. 
Ives, might attract Venetians and 
Genoese with silk, pepper, and spices 
of the East, Flemings with fine 
cloths and linens, Spaniards with 
iron and wine, Norwegians with tar 
and pitch from their forests, and 
Baltic merchants with furs, amber, 
and salted fish. The fairs, by fos- 
tering commerce, helped to make 
the various European peoples better 
acquainted with one another. 

Commerce in western Europe had 
almost disappeared as a result of 
the Teutonic invasions and the es- 
tablishment of feudalism. What little commercial intercourse 
there was encountered many obstacles. A merchant 
who went by land from country to country might 
expect to find bad roads, few bridges, and poor inns. 
Goods were transported on pack-horses instead of 
wagons. Highway robbery was so common that travelers 
always carried arms and usually united in bands for better pro- 
tection. The feudal lords, often themselves not much more than 
highwaymen, demanded tolls at every bridge and ford and on 
every road. If the merchant proceeded by water, he must face, 
in addition to the ordinary hazards of wind and wave, the 
danger from the ill-lighted coasts and from attacks by pirates. 
No wonder commerce languished in the early Middle Ages and 
for a long time lay chiefly in the hands of Byzantines and Arabs. 

Even during the dark centuries that followed the end of the 



Jacob Fugger 

After a wood engraving. This 
merchant prince, a contemporary 
of Columbus, lived at Augsburg in 
Germany, where he amassed an 
enormous fortune. 



Decline of 
commerce in 
the early 
Middle Ages 



230 



Medieval Civilization 




Trade Routes between Northern and Southern Europe in the 
13TH and 14TH Centuries 

Roman Empire, some trade with the Orient had been carried 
Commercial on ^y tne cities of Italy and southern France, 
revival after The crusades, which brought East and West face 
e crusa es ^ f ace ^ g rea tly increased this trade. 1 The Mediter- 
ranean lands first felt the stimulating effects of intercourse with 
1 See pages 189-190. 




REIMS CATHEDRAL 

The cathedral of Notre Dame at Reims in northwestern France stands on the site where 
Clovis was baptized by St. Remi. Here most of the French kings were consecrated with 
holy oil by the archbishops of Reims. Except the west front, which was built in the four- 
teenth century, the cathedral was completed by the end of the thirteenth century. The 
towers, 267 feet high, were originally designed to reach 394 feet. The facade, with its three 
arched portals, exquisite rose window, and "gallery of the kings," is justly celebrated. The 
cathedral — walls, roof, statues, and windows — was terribly damaged by the German bom- 
bardment during the late war. 



Cathedrals and Universities 231 

the Orient, but before long the commercial revival extended to 
other parts of Europe. 

Before the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope the spices, 
drugs, incense, carpets, tapestries, porcelains, and gems of India, 
China, and the East Indies reached the West by Asiatic trade 
three main routes. 1 All had been used in ancient routes 
times. The central and most important route led up the 
Persian Gulf and Tigris River to Bagdad, from which city goods 
went by caravan to Antioch or Damascus. The southern route 
reached Cairo and Alexandria by way of, the Red Sea and the 
Nile. By taking advantage of the monsoons, a merchant ship 
could make the voyage from India to Egypt in about three 
months. The northern route, entirely overland, led to ports on 
the Black Sea and thence to Constantinople. It traversed high 
mountain passes and long stretches of desert, and hence was 
profitably used only for the transport of valuable articles small 
in bulk. The conquests of the Ottoman Turks greatly inter- 
fered with the use of this route by Christians after the middle 
of the fifteenth century. 

Oriental goods, upon reaching the Mediterranean, could be 
transported by water to northern Europe. Every year the 
Venetians sent a fleet loaded with eastern products European 
to Bruges in Flanders, a city which was the most traderoutes 
important depot of trade with Germany, England, and Scan- 
dinavia. Bruges also formed the terminus of the main overland, 
route leading from Venice over the Alps and down the Rhine. 
Many other commercial highways also linked the Mediterranean 
with the North Sea and the Baltic. C*~~ 

69. Cathedrals and Universities 

For several centuries after the barbarian invasions, archi- 
tecture made little progress in western Europe, outside of Italy, 
which was subject to Byzantine influence, and Romanesque 
Spain, which was a center of Arabian culture. The architecture 
architectural revival dates from the time of Charlemagne, with 

1 See the map facing page 192. 



232 



Medieval Civilization 



the adoption of the style of building called Romanesque, because 
it made use of vaulting, domes, and the round arch, as in Roman 
structures. 1 

The style of building called Gothic (after the Goths) prevailed 
during the later Middle Ages. It formed a natural development 
Gothic from Romanesque. The architects of a Gothic 

architecture cathedral wished to retain the vaulted ceiling, but 
at the same time to do away with thick, solid walls, which had 




Baptistery, Cathedral, and "Leaning Tower" or Pisa 

These three buildings in the piazza of Pisa form one of the most interesting architectural 
groups in Italy. The baptistery, completed in 1278, is a circular structure, 100 feet in diameter 
and covered with a high dome. The cathedral was consecrated in n 18. The finest part 
of the building is the west front with its four open arcades. The campanile, or bell tower, 
reaches a height of 179 feet. Owing to the sinking of the foundations, it leans from the per- 
pendicular to a striking extent (now about i6>^ feet). 

so little window space as to leave the interior of the building dark 
and gloomy. They solved this problem, in the first place, by 
using a great number of stone ribs, which rested on columns and 
gathered up the weight of the ceiling. Ribbed vaulting made 
possible higher ceilings, spanning wider areas, than in Roman- 
esque churches. In the second place, the columns supporting 
the ribs were themselves connected by means of flying buttresses 



1 See the illustrations on pages 232 and 260. 



Cathedrals and Universities 



233 



with stout piers of masonry outside the walls of the church. 
These walls, relieved from the pressure of the ceiling, now be- 
came a mere screen to keep out the weather. They could be 
built of light materials and filled with high and wide windows. 
Gothic builders also substituted for the Roman round arch the 
lighter and more graceful pointed 
arch, which had long been known 
and used by the Arabs. 

The labors of the Gothic archi- 
tect were admirably seconded by 
those of other artists. Gothic 
The sculptor CUt fig- ornament 
ures of men, animals, and plants 
in the utmost profusion. The 
painter covered vacant wall spaces 
with brilliant frescoes. The wood- 
carver made exquisite choir stalls, 
pulpits, altars, and screens. 
Master workmen filled the stone 
tracery of the windows with 
stained glass unequaled in color- 
ing by the finest modern w r ork. 
The interior of a Gothic cathe- 
dral, with its vast nave rising in 
swelling arches to the vaulted 
roof, its clustered columns, its 
glowing windows, and infinite 
variety of ornamentation, forms 
the most awe-inspiring sanctuary ever raised by man. 

The universities developed from cathedral and monastic 
schools, where boys were trained to become priests or monks. 
The teaching, which lay entirely in the hands of the Elementary 
clergy, was elementary in character. Pupils learned educat »on 
enough Latin grammar to read religious books, if not always to 
understand them, and enough music to follow the services of 
the Church. They also studied arithmetic by means of the 
awkward Roman notation, received a smattering of geometry 




Cross Section of Amiens 
Cathedral 

A, vaulting; B, ribs; C, flying but- 
tresses; D, buttresses; E, low windows; 
F, clerestory. 



234 



Medieval Civilization 




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and astronomy, and 
sometimes gained a 
little knowledge of 
such subjects as 
geography, law, and 
philosophy. Besides 
these Church schools, 
others were main- 
tained by the guilds 
and also by private 
benefactors. 

There are about 
fifty European uni- 
Rise of versities 

universities dating 
from the later Middle 
Ages. They arose, 
as it were, sponta- 
neously. Western 
Europe in the elev- 
enth and twelfth cen- 
turies felt the thrill 
of a great intellectual 
revival. It was stim- 
ulated by intercourse 
with the highly cul- 
tivated Arabs in 
Spain, Sicily, and the 
East, and with the 
Greek scholars of 
Constantinople dur- 
ing the crusades. 
The desire for instruction became so general that the elementary 
schools could not satisfy it. Other schools were then opened in 
the cities, and to them flocked eager learners from every quarter. 
Such was the origin of the University of Paris, which at one time 
had more than five thousand students. It furnished the model for 




A Hornbook 

A child's primer framed in wood and covered with a 
thin plate of transparent horn. It included the alphabet 
in small letters and in capitals, with vowel combinations 
and the Lord's Prayer in English. This particular ex- 
ample was found at Oxford and is now in the Bodleian 
Library. 



Cathedrals and Universities 



235 




the English university of Oxford, as well as for the learned insti- 
tutions of Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, and Germany. Those in 
Italy and Spain were modeled, more or 
less, upon the university of Bologna. 
V The word "university" 1 meant at 
'first simply a union or association. In 
the Middle Ages all artisans University 
belonged to guilds, 2 and organization 
when teachers and pupils associated 
themselves for study they naturally 
copied the guild form of organization. 
After passing part of his examination, a 
student (apprentice) became a "bachelor 
of arts" (journeyman) and might teach 
certain elementary subjects to those 
beneath him. Upon the completion of 
the full course — usually six years in 
length — the bachelor took his final 
examination and, if successful, received 
the coveted degree of "master of arts." 

The members of a university usually 
lived in a number of colleges. These 
seem to have been at first 
little more than lodging- 
houses, where poor students were cared 
for at the expense of some benefactor. 
As the colleges increased in wealth, 
through the gifts made to them, they 
became centers of instruction under the 
direction of masters. At Oxford and 
Cambridge, where the collegiate system 
has been retained to the present time, 
each college possesses separate buildings and enjoys the privilege 
of self-government. 

A university of the Middle Ages did not need an expensive 
collection of libraries, laboratories, and museums. Its only 

1 Latin univcrsitas. 2 Sec page 227. 



Colleges 



Tower of Magdalen 
College, Oxford 

Magdalen (pronounced 
Maudlin) is perhaps the 
most beautiful college in 
Oxford. The bell tower 
stands on High Street, the 
principal thoroughfare of 
Oxford, and adjoins Mag- 
dalen Bridge, built across 
the Chenvell. Begun in 
1492; completed in 1505. 
From its summit a Latin 
hymn is sung every year on 
the morning of May Day. 
This graceful tower has been 
several times imitated in 
American collegiate struc- 
tures. 



236 



Medieval Civilization 



Teaching 



Studies 



necessary equipment consisted of lecture rooms for the pro- 
fessors. Not even benches or chairs were required, for students 
often sat on the straw-strewn floors. The high price 
of manuscripts compelled professors to give all in- 
struction by lectures. This method of teaching has been re- 
tained in modern universities, because even the printed book 
is a poor substitute for a scholar's inspiring words. 

The studies in a 
medieval university 
were grouped 
under the 
f$ur faculties of arts, 
theology, law, and 
medicine. The first- 
named faculty taught 
the ''seven liberal 
arts," that is, gram- 
mar, rhetoric, logic, 
arithmetic, music, 
geometry, and astron- 
omy. Theology, law, 
and medicine then, as 
now, were professional 
studies, taken up after 
the completion of the Arts course. Owing to the constant 
movement of students from one university to another, each 
institution tended to specialize in one or more fields of learning. 
Thus, Paris came to be noted for theology, Montpellier, Padua, 
and Salerno for medicine, and Orleans, Bologna, and Salamanca 
for law. 




A University Lecture 

After a fifteenth-century manuscript 
in the British Museum. 



60. National Languages during the Later Middle Ages 

Latin continued to be an international language throughout 
Latin as an the me dieval period. The Roman Church used it for 
international papal bulls and other documents. Prayers were re- 
cited, hymns were sung, and sometimes sermons were 
preached in Latin. It was also the language of men of culture 



National Languages During Later Middle Ages 237 

everywhere in Christendom. University professors lectured in 
Latin, students spoke Latin, lawyers addressed judges in Latin, 
and the merchants in different countries wrote Latin letters 
to one another. All learned books were composed in Latin until 
the close of the sixteenth century. This practice has not yet 
been entirely abandoned by scholars. 

Each European country during the later Middle Ages had 
also its own national tongue. The Romance languages, including 
modern French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and The 
Rumanian, were derived from the Latin spoken by Romance 
the Romanized inhabitants of the lands now known anguage 
as France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Rumania. 1 Their col- 
loquial Latin naturally lacked the elegance of the literary Latin 
used by Caesar, Cicero, and other ancient authors. The dif- 
ference between the written and spoken forms of the language 
became more marked from the fifth century onward, in con- 
sequence of the barbarian invasions. Gradually in each coun- 
try new and vigorous tongues arose, related to, yet different 
from, the old classical Latin in pronunciation, grammar, and 
vocabulary. 

The popular Latin of the Gallo-Romans gave rise to two 
groups of languages in medieval France. The first was used 
in the southern part of the country; it was called 
Provencal (from Provence). The second was 
spoken in the north, particularly in the region about Paris. The 
unification of the French kingdom under Hugh Capet and his 
successors 2 gradually extended the speech of northern France 
over the entire country. Modern French contains less than a 
thousand words introduced by the German invaders of Gaul, 
while the words of Celtic origin are even fewer in number. 
Nearly all the rest are derived from Latin. 

The Teutonic peoples who remained outside what had been 
the limits of the Roman world continued to use their native 
tongues during the Middle Ages. From them have The Teutonic 
come modern German, Dutch, Flemish, and the languages 
various Scandinavian languages (Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, 

1 See page [46. - Sec page 199. 



238 Medieval Civilization 

and Icelandic). 1 All these languages in their earliest known 
forms show unmistakable traces of a common origin. 

Britain was the only Roman province in the west of Europe 
where a Teutonic language took root and maintained itself. 
Here the rough, guttural speech of the Anglo- 
Saxons completely drove out the popular Latin. 
In course of time Anglo-Saxon underwent various changes. 
Christian missionaries, from the seventh century onward, intro- 
duced many new Latin terms for church offices, services, and 
observances. The Danes, besides contributing some place- 
names, gave us that most useful word are, and also the habit of 
using to before an infinitive. The coming of the Normans 
deeply affected Anglo-Saxon. Norman-French influence helped 
to make the language simpler, by ridding it of the cumbersome 
declensions and conjugations which it had in common with all 
Teutonic tongues. Many new Norman-French words also crept 
in, as the hostility of the English people toward their con- 
querors disappeared. 

Anglo-Saxon, by the middle of the thirteenth century, had so 
far developed that it may now be called English. In the poems 
of Chaucer (about 1340-1400), especially his 
Canterbury Tales, English wears quite a modern 
look, though the reader is sometimes troubled by the old spelling 
and by certain words not now in use. The changes in the 
grammar of the language have been so extremely slight since 
the end of the fifteenth century that any Englishman of ordinary 
education can read without difficulty a book written more than 
four hundred years ago. English has been, and still is, extremely 
hospitable to new words, so that its vocabulary has grown very 
fast by the adoption of terms from Latin, French, and other 
tongues. These have immensely increased the expressiveness 
of English, while giving it a position midway between the very 
different Romance and Teutonic languages. 

Our survey of medieval civilization has been largely confined 
to the later Middle Ages — the period from about 1000 to about 

1 Icelandic is the oldest and purest form of Scandinavian. Danish and Norwegian 
are practically the same; in fact, their literary or book-language is one. 



National Languages During Later Middle Ages 239 

1 500. When the Arabs had brought the culture of the Near East 
lo Spain and Sicily, when the Northmen after their wonderful 
expansion had settled down in Normandy. England „ .. 

Medieval 

and other countries, and when the peoples of civilization 

western Europe, whether as pilgrims or crusaders, and the Re- 

1 naissance 

had visited Constantinople and the Holy Land, 

men's minds received a wonderful stimulus. The intellectual 

life of Europe was ''speeded up," and the way was prepared for 

the even more rapid advance of civilization in the sixteen tli 

century, as the Middle Ages passed into the Renaissance. 



Studies 

1. What parts of Europe were Christianized before Soo, between Soo-noo, and 
after i too (map between pages 204-205)? 2. ''Medieval Europe was a camp with 
a church in the background." Comment on this statement. 3. Mention some 
respects in which the Roman Church during the Middle Apes differed from any 
religious society at the present, day. 4. Distinguish between the faith of the Church, 
the organisation of the Church, and the Church as a. force in history. 5. "The monks 
and the friars were the militia of the Church." Comment on this statement. 6. 
Enumerate the principal benefits which the monastic system conferred on Europe. 
7. Who is the present pope? When and by whom was he elected? In what city 
does he reside? What is his residence called? 8. Describe the agricultural processes 
and implements shown in the illustration on page 218. 9. Show that the serf wa 
not a slave or a "hired man" or a tenant-farmer paying rent. 10. Why has the 
medieval city been called the "birthplace of modern democracy''? n. Compare 
the merchant guild with the modern chamber of commerce, and craft guilds with 
modem trade unions. 12. Why was there no antagonism between labor and 
capital under the guild system? 13. Show that Venice in medieval times was the 
seaport nearest the heart of commercial Europe. 14. Trace on the map facing page 
ni2 tlie chief hind and water routes between Europe and Asia during the Middle 
Ages. 15. Distinguish between the Romanesque and Gothic styles of architecture. 
What is the origin of each term? 10. Contrast a Gothic cathedral with a Creek 
temple, particularly in regard to size, height, supporl uf the roof, windows, and 

decorative features. 17. Compare medieval with modern universities, noting both 

ablances and difference between them. t8. Show how Latin served as an 
international language in the Middle Ages. id. Knumerate the most important 
contributions to civilization made during the Middle Ages. 



CHAPTER VII 
THE RENAISSANCE 1 

61. Revival of Learning and Art in Italy 

The French word Renaissance means Rebirth or Revival. It 
is a convenient term for all the change in society, law, and 
Transition government, in science, philosophy, and religion, 
to modem and in literature and art which transformed 
medieval civilization into that of modern times. 
The Renaissance, just because of its transitional character, 
cannot be exactly dated. In general, it covers the sixteenth 
century. Many Renaissance movements, however, began much 
earlier. Among those which we have already noticed were the 
rise of strong national states, replacing feudalism as a system of 
government, the growth of cities, the decline and ultimate ex- 
tinction of serfdom, and the commercial progress which attended 
and followed the crusades. The Renaissance thus appears as a 
gradual development out of the Middle Ages, not as a sudden 
revolution. 

The name Renaissance applied, at first, only to the rebirth 
or revival of man's interest in the civilization of classical an- 
Original tiquity. Italy was the original home of this 

home of the Renaissance. There it first appeared, there it 
found widest acceptance, and there it reached its 
highest development. From Italy the Renaissance spread be- 
yond the Alps, until it had made the round of western Europe. 

Italy was a land particularly favorable to the growth of 
learning and the arts. The great cities of Milan, Pisa, Genoa, 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter xix, "A Scholar 
of the Renaissance"; chapter xx, "Renaissance Artists"; chapter xxi, "The 
Travels of Marco Polo"; chapter xxii, "The Aborigines of the New World"; chap- 
ter xxiii, "Martin Luther and the Beginning of the Reformation"; chapter xxiv, 
"England in the Age of Elizabeth." 

240 



Revival of Learning and Art in Italy 241 



Florence, Venice, and many others had early succeeded in throw- 
ing off their feudal burdens and had become independent, self- 
governing communities. Democracy flourished in Italian cities 
them, as in the old Greek city-states. Noble birth of theRenais- 
counted for little; a man of ability and ambition 
might rise to any place. The fierce party conflicts within 
their walls stimulated mental activity and helped to make 
life full, varied, and intense. Their widespread trade and 
thriving manufactures made them prosperous. Wealth brought 
leisure, bred a taste for luxury and 
the refinements of life, and gave 
means for the gratification of that 
taste. People wanted to have about 
them beautiful pictures, statuary, 
furniture, palaces, and churches; and 
they rewarded richly the artists who 
could produce such things. It is not 
without significance that the birth- 
place of the Italian Renaissance 
was democratic, industrial, and 
wealthy Florence. 

The literature of Rome did not 
entirely disappear in western Europe 
after the Teutonic invasions. The 

monastery and cathedral schools of the Middle Ages had 
nourished devoted students of ancient books. The Benedictine 
monks labored zealously in copying the works of R enewe d i n _ 
pagan as well as Christian authors. The rise of terest in the 
universities made it possible for the student to 
pursue a fairly extended course in Latin literature at more 
than one institution of learning. Reverence for the classics 
finds constant expression in the writings of the Italian poet 
Dante (1265-1321), whose Divine Comedy, describing an imag- 
inary visit to hell, purgatory, and paradise, ranks among the 
world's masterpieces of literature. Petrarch (1304-1374) did 
much to spread a knowledge of Latin authors. He traveled 
widely in Italy, France, and other countries, searching every- 




Mask of Dante 



242 



The Renaissance 




Humanism 



where for ancient manuscripts and employing copyists to 
transcribe those which he discovered or borrowed. Petrarch, 
however, knew almost no Greek. His copy of Homer, it is 
said, he often kissed, though he could not read it. Renewed 
interest in the literature of Greece dates from the fifteenth 
century, when the advance of the Ottoman Turks, culmin- 
ating in the capture of 
Constantinople, 1 sent a 
stream of Greek exiles into 
Italy. Some of them were 
learned men, and their 
conversation and lectures 
greatly stimulated the 
study of Greek in the 
West. 

The languages and liter- 
atures of ancient Greece 
and Rome 
opened up a 
new world of thought and 
fancy to scholars. They 
were delighted by the 
fresh, original, and liberal 
ideas which they dis- 
covered in the pages of 
Homer, Plato, Cicero, and 
other ancient writers. 
Humanism, 2 as the study of the classics was called, before long 
gained an entrance into university courses, displacing theology 
and philosophy as the chief subject of instruction. From the 
universities it descended to the lower schools, where Greek and 
especially Latin — the "humanities" — still hold a prominent 
place in the curriculum. 

The revival of learning was immensely stimulated when 
books printed on linen paper by movable type made their 

1 See page 104. 
2 Latin kumanitas, "literary culture." 



An Early Printing Press 

Enlarged from the printer's mark of I. 



B. 



Ascensius. Used on the title pages of books printed 
by him between 1507-1535. 



Revival of Learning and Art in Italy 243 

appearance. Paper-making originated in China, and the Arabs 
introduced the art into Spain and Italy during the Middle 
Ages. A long time elapsed, however, before paper .. 

, , , , ' V l Printing 

became abundant and cheap enough to serve as 
a substitute for papyrus and parchment. Movable type had 
been used for several centuries in the Far East, and in Europe 
several printers have been credited with its invention. A 
German, Johann Gutenberg of Mainz, seems to have set up the 
first practical printing press with movable type about 1450, 
and from it issued the first printed book. This was a Latin 
translation of the Bible. Printing met an especially warm wel- 
come in Italy, where people felt so keen a desire for reading and 
instruction. By the end of the fifteenth century Venice alone 
had more than two hundred printing presses. 

Printed books could be multiplied far more rapidly than 
manuscripts copied by hand. They could also be far more 
accurate than manuscripts, for, when an entire edi- significance 
tion was printed from the same type, mistakes in the of P nntin § 
different copies were eliminated. Furthermore, the invention 
of printing destroyed the monopoly of learning possessed by the 
universities and people of wealth. Books were now the posses- 
sion of the many, not the luxury of the few. Any one who could 
read had opened to him the gateway of knowledge; he became 
a citizen, henceforth, of the republic of letters. Printing, which 
made possible popular education, public libraries, and ulti- 
mately cheap newspapers, thus became a force emancipating 
mankind from bondage to ignorance. 

Gothic architecture, with its pointed arches, flying buttresses, 
and traceried windows, never struck deep roots in Italy. The 
architects of the Renaissance went back to Greek 
temples and Roman domed buildings for their 
models, just as the humanists went back to Greek and Latin 
literature. Long rows of Ionic or Corinthian columns, spanned 
by round arches, became again the prevailing architectural 
style. Perhaps the most important feature of Renaissance 
architecture was the use of the dome, instead of the vault, for 
the roofs of churches. The majestic cupola of St. Peter's at 



244 The Renaissance 

Rome has become the parent of many domed structures in the 
Old and in the New World. 1 Architects, however, did not limit 
themselves to churches. The magnificent palaces of Florence, 
as well as some of those in Venice, are monuments of the Renais- 
sance era. 

The development of architecture naturally stimulated other 
arts. Italian sculptors began to copy the ancient bas-reliefs 

„ , and statues preserved in Rome and other cities. 

Sculpture . 

The greatest of Renaissance sculptors was Michel- 
angelo (1475-1564). Though a Florentine by birth, he lived for 
most of his life in Rome. Michelangelo also won fame in archi- 
tecture and painting. The dome of St. Peter's was finished after 
his designs, while the frescoes on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel 
in the Vatican display his genius as a painter. 

Italian painting began in the service of the Church and long 
remained religious in character. Artists usually chose subjects 

from the Bible or the lives of the saints. They did 
Painting 

not trouble themselves to secure correctness 01 

costume, but painted ancient Jews, Greeks, and Romans in the 
garb of Italian gentlemen. Many of their pictures were frescoes, 
that is, the colors were mixed with water and applied to the 
plaster walls of churches and palaces. After the process of mix- 
ing oils with the colors was discovered, pictures on wood or 
canvas (easel paintings) became common. Italian painters ex- 
• celled in portraiture. They were less successful with landscapes. 
A list of the "Old Masters" of Italian painting always includes 
the names of Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Titian. 

Another modern art, that of music, arose in Italy during the 
Renaissance. In the sixteenth century, the three-stringed rebeck 

received a fourth string and became the violin, the 

Music . . 1 • a 

most expressive of all musical instruments. A 

forerunner of the pianoforte also appeared in the harpsichord. 

A papal organist and choir-master, Palestrina (1 526-1 594), was 

the first of the great composers. He gave music its fitting place 

in worship by composing melodious hymns and masses still 

1 For instance, the Invalides in Paris, St. Paul's in London, and the Capitol at 
Washington. 





Assumption of the \ 


irgin — Titian 


Sistine Madonna - 


-Raphael 


1 










+ 




p^nj 


■SR^BW 


.^s '.>.T£r 


i I H P "5 ' v S- • 


w | 




w+&k 






■T-* ' ^ ~ 


~ w 





The Last Supper — Leonardo da Vinci 





Marriage of St. Catherine Mona Lisa Gioconda 

Correggio Leonardo da Vinci 

ITALIAN PAINTINGS OF THE RENAISSANCE 



Spread of 
humanism in 
Europe 



Revival of Learning and Art Beyond Italy 245 

sung in Roman Catholic churches. The oratorio, a religious 
drama set to music but without action, scenery, or costume, had 
its beginning at this time. The opera, however, was little de- 
veloped until the eighteenth century. 

62. Revival of Learning and Art beyond Italy 

Italy had fostered the revival of learning by recovering the 
long-buried treasures of the classics and by providing means 
for their study. 
Scholars in Ger- 
many, France, 
and England, who now had 
the aid of the printing press, 
continued the intellectual 
movement and gave it wide- 
spread currency. The fore- 
most of these scholars was 
Erasmus (1466-1536), a native 
of Rotterdam in Holland. 
His travels and extensive cor- 
respondence brought him in 
touch with many learned men 
of the day. The most impor- 
tant achievement of Erasmus 
was an edition of the New 
Testament in the original 
Greek, with a Latin version. 
This work led to a better 

understanding of the New Testament and also prepared the way 
for translations of the Scriptures into the vernacular tongues. 

The renewed interest in classical studies for a while retarded 
the development of national languages and literatures in 
Europe. Humanists regarded only Latin and Thevernacu- 
Greek as worthy of attention. But a return to the lar tongues 
vernacular was bound to come. The common people, who 
understood little Latin and less Greek, had now learned to read 
and had the printing press. Before long many books composed 




Desideritjs Erasmus 

Louvre, Paris 
A portrait by the German artist, Hans 
Holbein the Younger (1497-1543). Prob- 
ably an excellent likeness of Erasmus. 



246 



The Renaissance 



in Italian, Spanish, French, English, and other national lan- 
guages made their appearance. This revival of the vernacular 
meant that henceforth European literature would be more 
creative and original than was possible when writers merely 
imitated or translated the classics. The sixteenth century, we 

remember, was the age of the 
Spaniard, Cervantes, whose Don 
Quixote is still so popular, of the 
Frenchman, Montaigne, author of 
many essays delightful in style 
and full of wit and wisdom, and 
of the Englishman, William 
Shakespeare, whose genius trans- 
cended national boundaries and 
made him a citizen of the world. 

Italian architects found a cor- 
dial reception in France, Spain, 
The artistic the Netherlands, and 
revival in other countries, 

William Shakespeare " where the y intro " 

From the copper-plate engraved by duced Renaissance styles of build- 

Martin Droeshout as frontispiece to the j n g an(1 Ornamentation. The Cele- 
First Folio edition of Shakespeare's works , , , , r . , T 

in 1623. in this engraving the head brated palace of the Louvre in 

is far too large for the body and the dress Paris, which is Used to-day as an 
is out of perspective. The only other .. , , 

authentic likeness of Shakespeare is the art gallery and museum, dates 

bust over his grave in Holy Trinity from the sixteenth Century. 1 At 
Church, Stratf ord-on-Avon. ,, . ,. -„ , , , ■. 

this time French nobles began 
to replace their somber feudal dwellings by elegant country 
houses. Renaissance sculpture also spread beyond Italy 
and throughout Europe. Painters in northern countries at first 
followed Italian models, but afterward produced masterpieces 
of their own. 

The Middle Ages were not by any means ignorant of science, 
Humanism but its study received a great impetus when the 
and science Renaissance brought before educated men all that 
the Greeks and Romans had done in mathematics, physics, 

1 See the illustration on page 443. • 




Revival of Learning and Art Beyond Italy 247 

astronomy, medicine, and other subjects. The invention of 
printing also fostered the scientific revival by making it easy 
to spread knowledge abroad in every land. The pioneers of 
Renaissance science were Italians, but students in France, 
England, Germany, and other countries soon took up the work 
of enlightenment. 

The first place among Renaissance scientists must be given 
to Copernicus (1473-1543), the founder of modern 
astronomy. He was a Pole, but lived for many ^^ Jbeory 
years in Italy. Research and calculation led him 
to the conclusion that the earth turns upon its own axis, and, 
together with the planets, revolves around the sun. The book 
in which he announced this conclusion did not appear until the 
very end of his life. Astronomers before Copernicus generally 
accepted the doctrine, formulated by the Greek scientist 
Ptolemy in the second century, that the earth was the center 
of the universe. Some students had indeed suggested that the 
earth and planets might rotate about a central sun, but Coper- 
nicus first gave adequate reasons for such a belief. An Italian 
astronomer, Galileo, made one of the first telescopes — it was 
about as powerful as an opera glass — and turned it on the 
heavenly bodies with wonderful results. He found the sun 
moving unmistakably on its axis, Venus showing phases accord- 
ing to her position in relation to the sun, Jupiter accompanied 
by revolving moons, or satellites, and the Milky Way composed 
of a multitude of separate stars. Galileo rightly believed that 
these discoveries confirmed the theory Of Copernicus. 

Copernicus, Galileo, and their fellow workers built up the 
scientific method. Students in the Middle Ages had mostly 
been satisfied to accept what Aristotle and other The scien- 
philosophers had said, without trying to verify their tlfic method 
statements. The new scientific method rested on observation 
and experiment. As Lord Bacon, one of Shakespeare's con- 
temporaries, declared, "All depends on keeping the eye steadily 
fixed upon the facts of nature, and so receiving their images 
simply as they are, for God forbid that we should give out a 
dream of our own imagination for a pattern of the world." 



248 The Renaissance 

Modern science, to which we owe so much, is a child of the 
Renaissance. 

63. Geographical Discovery 

There was also a geographical Renaissance. The revival of 
exploration brought about the discovery of ocean routes to the 
Revival of Far East and the Americas. In consequence, 
exploration commerce was vastly stimulated, and two conti- 
nents, hitherto unknown, were opened up to civilization. The 
geographical Renaissance thus cooperated with the other 
movements of the age in bringing about the transition from 
medieval to modern times. 

The Greeks and Romans had become familiar with a large 
part of Europe and Asia/ but much of their learning was either 
Medieval forgotten or perverted during the early Middle 
ignorance of Ages. Even the wonderful discoveries of the 
Northmen in the North Atlantic gradually faded 
from memory. The Arabs, whose conquests and commerce 
spread over so much of the Orient, far surpassed the Christian 
peoples of Europe in knowledge of the world. 

The crusades first extended geographical knowledge by fos- 
tering pilgrimages and missions in Oriental lands. Numerous 
The Polos merchants also visited the East. Among them 
in the East, were the Venetians, Nicolo and Maffeo Polo, and 
: Nicolo's son, Marco. The Polos made an adven- 

turous journey through the heart of Asia to the court of the 
Kublai Khan at Peking, or Cambaluc. The Mongol ruler, who 
seems to have been anxious to introduce Christianity and 
European culture among his people, received them in a friendly 
manner, and they amassed much wealth by trade. Marco 
entered the Khan's service and went on several expeditions to 
distant parts of the Mongol realm. Many years passed before 
Kublai would allow his useful guests to return to Europe. When 
they reached Venice after an absence of twenty-four years, their 
relatives were slow to recognize in them the long-lost Polos. 2 

1 See the footnote on page 109. 

2 For Marco Polo's route see the map facing page 192. 



Geographical Discovery 249 

The story of the Polos, as written down at Marco's dictation, 
became one of the most popular works of the Middle Ages. In 
this book people read of far Cathay (China), with Marco 
its wealth, its huge cities, and swarming population, Polo ' s book 
of mysterious and secluded Tibet, of Burma, Siam, and Cochin- 
China, with their palaces and pagodas, of the East Indies, famed 
for spices, of Ceylon, abounding in pearls, and of India, little 
known since the days of Alexander the Great. Even Cipango 
(Japan) Marco described from hearsay as an island whose 
inhabitants were white, civilized, and so rich in gold that the 
royal palace was roofed and paved with that metal. The 
accounts of these countries naturally made Europeans more 
eager than ever to reach the East. 

The new knowledge concerning the land routes of Asia was 
accompanied by much progress in the art of ocean navigation. 
The most important invention was that of the Aids to 
mariner's compass. It enabled sailors to find their ex P loratlon 
bearings even in murky weather and on starless nights. The 
astrolabe, which the Greeks had invented and used for astronom- 
ical purposes, seems to have been introduced into Europe 
through the Arabs. It was employed to calculate latitudes by 
observation of the height of the sun above the horizon. The 
charting of coasts became a science during the last centuries 
of the Middle Ages. Manuals were prepared to give information 
about the tides, currents, and other features of sea-routes. The 
increase in size of ships made navigation safer and permitted 
the storage of bulky cargoes. For long voyages the sailing 
vessel replaced the medieval galley rowed by oars. As the result 
of all these aids to exploration, sailors no longer found it neces- 
sary to keep close to shore, but could push out into the ocean. 

The needs of commerce largely account for early exploring 
voyages. Eastern spices — cinnamon, pepper, cloves, nutmeg, 
and ginger — were used more freely in medieval commercial 
times than now, when people lived on salt meat motive for 
during the winter and salt fish during Lent. Even exp 0ratl0n 
wine, ale, and medicines had a seasoning of spices. Besides 
spices, all kinds of precious stones, drugs, perfumes, gums, dyes, 



2 5° 



The Renaissance 



and fragrant woods came from the East. Since the time of the 
crusades these luxuries, after having been brought overland 
or by water to Mediterranean ports, had been distributed by 




Behaim' s Globe 

The ideas of European geographers in the period just preceding the discovery of America 
are represented on a map, or rather a globe, which dates from 1402. It was made by a 
German navigator, Martin Behaim, for his native city of Nuremberg, where it is still pre- 
served. Behaim shows the mythical island of St. Brandan, lying in mid-ocean, and beyond 
it Cipango, the East Indies, and Cathay. The outlines of North America and South America 
here shown, do not appear, of course, on the original globe. 

Venetian and Genoese merchants throughout Europe. 1 Two 
other European peoples — the Portuguese and Spaniards — now 
appeared as competitors for this Oriental trade. Their efforts 
to break through the monopoly enjoyed by the Italian cities 



1 See page 



Geographical Discovery 251 

led to the discovery of the sea-routes to the Indies. The Port- 
uguese were first in the field. 

Gradual exploration of the western coast of Africa and the 
discovery of the Cape of Good Hope in 1487 had convinced the 
Portuguese that the Indies could be reached by a Da Q ama > s 
maritime route. A daring mariner, Vasco da voyage, 
Gama, soon proved this true by sailing from Lisbon I497 " 149 
to Calicut on the southwestern coast of India. When Da Gama 
returned to Lisbon, he brought back a cargo which repaid sixty 
times the cost of the expedition. The Portuguese king received 
him with high honor and created him Admiral of the Indies. 

Six years before Vasco da Gama cast anchor in the harbor of 
Calicut, another intrepid sailor, seeking the Indies by a western 
route, accidentally discovered America. It does The giobu- 
not detract from the glory of Columbus to show lar tneor y 
that the way for his discovery had been long in preparation. 
In the first place, the theory that the earth is round had been 
familiar to the Greeks and Romans, and to some learned men 
even in the darkest period of the Middle Ages. The awakening 
of interest in Greek science, as a result of the Renaissance, 
called renewed attention to the statements by ancient geogra- 
phers. After the revival of Ptolemy's works in the fifteenth 
century, scholars very generally accepted the globular theory; 
and they even went so far as to calculate the circumference of 
the earth. 

In the second place, men had long believed that west of 
Europe, beyond the strait of Gibralter, lay mysterious lands. 
This notion first appears in the writings of the Atlantis and 
Greek philosopher, Plato, who repeats an old St. Brandan's 
tradition concerning Atlantis. According to Plato, 
Atlantis had been an island, continental in size, but thousands 
of years before his time it had sunk beneath the sea. A wide- 
spread legend of the Middle Ages also described the visit made 
by St. Brandan, an Irish monk, to the "promised land of the 
saints," an earthly paradise far out in the Atlantic. St. Bran- 
dan's Island was marked on early maps, and voyages in search 
of it were sometimes undertaken. 



252 



The Renaissance 



All know the story of the first voyage of Columbus. When 
he started out, he firmly believed that a journey of only four 
First voyage thousand miles would bring him to Cipango and 
of Columbus, the realms of the Great Khan of Cathay. The 
error was natural enough, for Ptolemy had reckoned 
the earth's circumference to be about one-sixth less than it. is, 
and Marco Polo had given an exaggerated idea of the distance 

to which Asia ex- 
tended toward the 
east. The name West 
Indies, applied to the 
islands discovered by 
Columbus, still re- 
mains as a testimony 
to this error. 

Shortly after the 
return of Columbus 
The demarca- from his 
tion line, 149a firstvoy- 
age, Pope Alexander 
VI, in response to a 
request by Ferdinand 
and Isabella, issued a 
bull granting these sovereigns exclusive rights over the newly dis- 
covered lands. In order that the Spanish possessions should be 
clearly marked off from those of the Portuguese, the pope laid 
down an imaginary line of demarcation in the Atlantic, three 
hundred miles west of the Azores. All new discoveries west of 
the line were to belong to Spain and all those east of it, to Port- 
ugal. 1 But this arrangement, which excluded France, England, 
and other European countries from the New World, could not 
be long maintained. 

The demarcation line had a good deal to do in bringing about 
the first voyage around the globe. So far no one had yet realized 

1 In 1494 the demarcation line was shifted about eight.hundred miles farther to 
the west. Six years later, when the Portuguese discovered Brazil, that country 
was f<5und to lie within their sphere of influence. See the map between pages 254-255. 




The "Santa Maria," Flagship 
or Columbus 

After the model reproduced for the Columbian Exposi- 
tion at Chicago, 1893. 



Colonial Empires 253 

the dream of Columbus to reach the lands of spice and silk by 
sailing westward. Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese in the ser- 
vice of Spain, believed that the Spice Islands lay _. 

1 ... Circumnavi- 

within the Spanish sphere of influence and that a gation of the 
route to them could be found through some strait £ lobe > J 5i9- 
at the southern end of South America. The Spanish 
ruler, Charles V, grandson of the Isabella who had supported 
Columbus, looked with favor upon Magellan's ideas and pro- 
vided a fleet of five vessels for the undertaking. After exploring 
the eastern coast of South America, Magellan came at length to 
the strait which now bears his name. He sailed boldly through 
this strait into an ocean called by him the Pacific, because of its 
peaceful aspect. A voyage of ninety-eight days across the 
Pacific brought him to the Ladrone or Marianas Islands. 
Magellan then proceeded to the Philippines, where he was 
killed in a fight with the natives. His men, however, managed 
to reach the Spice Islands. A single ship, the Victoria, 
subsequently carried back to Spain the few sailors who had 
survived the hardships of a journey lasting nearly three years. 
Magellan's voyage forms a landmark of geographical discovery. 
It proved that America, at least on the south, had no connection 
with Asia; it showed the enormous extent of the Pacific Ocean; 
and it led to the discovery of many large islands in the East 
Indies. Henceforth men knew of a certainty that the earth is 
round and in the distance covered by Magellan they had a 
rough estimate of its size. The circumnavigation of the globe 
ranks with the discovery of the sea-routes to the Indies and to 
America among the most significant events of history. 

64. Colonial Empires 

After Da Gama's voyage the Portuguese made haste to 
appropriate the wealth of the Indies. By the middle of the 
sixteenth century they had acquired almost com- p ortU g Ue se 
plete ascendancy throughout southern Asia and ascendancy 
the adjacent islands. Their colonial empire 
included many trading coasts in Africa, Ormuz at the entrance 
to the Persian Gulf, the western coast of India, Ceylon, Malacca 



254 The Renaissance 

at the end of the Malay Peninsula, and various possessions in 
the Malay Archipelago. 

The Portuguese came to the East as the successors of the 
Arabs, who for centuries had conducted an extensive trade 
Portuguese on the Indian Ocean. Having dispossessed the 
trade mo- Arabs, the Portuguese took care to shut out all 
nopo y European competitors. Only their own merchants 

were allowed to bring goods from the Indies to Europe by the 
Cape route. Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, formed the chief 
depot for spices and other eastern commodities. The French, 
English, and Dutch came there to buy them and took the place 
of Italian merchants in distributing them throughout Europe. 

The triumph of Portugal was short-lived. This small coun- 
try, with a population of not more than a million, lacked the 
Collapse of strength to defend her claims to a monopoly of the 
the Portu- Oriental trade. During the seventeenth century 
guese power ^ e F re nch and English broke the power of the 
Portuguese in India, while the Dutch drove them from Ceylon 
and the East Indies. 

The discoverers of the New World were naturally the pioneers 
in its exploration. The adventures of Ponce de Leon, who dis- 
Spanish covered Florida in 15 13, of Balboa, who sighted the 

ascendancy Pacific in the same year, of Cortes, who overthrew 
the Aztec power in Mexico, of Pizarro, who con- 
quered the Incas of Peru, of De Soto, and of Coronado are 
familiar to every reader of American history. There men laid 
the foundations of the Spanish colonial empire. It included 
Florida, New Mexico, California, Mexico, Central America, the 
West Indies, and all South America except Brazil. 1 The rule 
of Spain over these dominions lasted nearly three hundred 
years. During this time she gave her language, her government, 
and her religion to half the New World. 

The government of Spain administered its colonial dominions 
in the spirit of monopoly. As far as possible, it excluded 

1 The Philippines, which Magellan discovered in 1521, also belonged to Spain, 
though by the demarcation line these islands lay witliin the Portuguese sphere of 
influence. 




160° 140 Longitude 120° West 



80° 60° 40° 20° 



20° 40° 60° 80° 




The Old World and the New 255 

French, English, and other foreigners from trading with Spanish 
America. It also discouraged ship-building, manufacturing, and 
i. \ en the cultivation of the vine and the olive, lest Spanish 
the colonists should compete with home industries, colonial 
The colonies were regarded only as a work-shop p0icy 
for the production of the precious metals and raw materials. 
This unwise policy partly accounts for the economic backward- 
ness of Mexico, Peru, and other Spanish-American countries. 

65. The Old World and the New 

The New World contained two virgin continents, rich in 
natural resources and capable of extensive colonization. The 
native peoples, comparatively few in number and Expansion 
barbarian in culture, could not offer much resistance of Eur °P e 
to the explorers, missionaries, traders, and colonists from the Old 
World. The Spanish and Portuguese in the sixteenth century', 
followed by the French, English, and Dutch in the seven- 
teenth century, repeopled America and brought to it European 
civilization. Europe expanded into a Greater Europe beyond 
the ocean. 

In the Middle Ages the Mediterranean and the Baltic had been 
the principal highways of commerce. The discovery of America, 
followed immediately by the opening of the Cape shifting of 
route to the Indies, shifted commercial activity trade routes 
from these inclosed seas to the Atlantic Ocean. Venice, Genoa, 
Hamburg, Liibeck, and Bruges gradually gave way, as trading 
centers, to Lisbon and Cadiz, Bordeaux and Cherbourg, Ant- 
werp and Amsterdam, London and Liverpool. One may say, 
therefore, that the year 1492 inaugurated the Atlantic period of 
European history. 

The discovery of America revealed to Europeans a new source 

of the precious metals. The Spaniards soon secured large 

quantities of gold by plundering the Indians of 

Mexico and Peru of their stored-up wealth. The production 

output of silver much exceeded that of gold, as soon of the P re ~ 

~ 1 r 11 cious metals 

as the Spaniards began to work the wonderfully 

rich silver mines of Potosi in Bolivia. It is estimated that, by 



256 The Renaissance 

the end of the sixteenth century, the American mines had 

produced at least three times as much gold and silver as had been 

current in Europe at the beginning of the century. 

The Spaniards could not keep this new treasure. Having few 

industries themselves, they were obliged to send it out, as fast 

as they received it, in payment for their imports of 

quences of European goods. Spain acted as a huge sieve 

the enlarged through which the gold and silver of America en- 
money supply . 

tered all the countries of Europe. Money, now 

more plentiful, purchased far less "than in former times; in other 
words, the prices of all commodities rose, wages advanced, and 
manufacturers and traders had additional capital to use in their 
undertakings. The Middle Ages suffered from the lack of 
sufficient money with which to do business; from the beginning 
of modern times the world has been better supplied with the in- 
dispensable medium of exchange. 

But America was much more than a treasury of the precious 
metals. Many commodities, hitherto unknown, soon found their 
New com- wa y ^ rom t ^ ie -^ ew World to the Old. Among these 
modities were maize, the potato, which, when cultivated in 

impor e Europe, became the "bread of the poor," chocolate 

and cocoa made from the seeds of the cacao tree, Peruvian bark, 
or quinine, so useful in malarial fevers, cochineal, the dye-woods 
of Brazil, and the mahogany of the West Indies. America also 
sent to Europe large supplies of cane-sugar, molasses, fish, whale- 
oil, and furs. These new American products became common 
articles of consumption and so raised the standard of living in 
European countries. 

To the economic effects of the discoveries must be added their 
effects on politics. The Atlantic Ocean now formed, not only 
P lit' al the commercial, but also the political center of the 

effects of the world. The Atlantic-facing countries, first Por- 
lscovenes tugal an d Spain, then Holland, France, and 
England, became the great powers of Europe. Their trade 
rivalries and contests for colonial possessions have been potent 
causes of European wars for the last four hundred years. 

The sixteenth century in Europe was the age of that revolt 



The Protestant Reformation 257 

against the Roman Church called the Protestant Reformation. 
During this period, however, the Church won her victories over 
the American aborigines. What she lost of territory, wealth, and 
inlluence in Europe was offset bv what she mined in 

_, , ' . . , Effects of 

America, furthermore, the region now occupied the discov- 

by the United States furnished in the seventeenth eries upon 

, , ... . religion 

century an asylum from religious persecution, as 

was proved when Puritans settled in New England, Roman 

Catholics in Maryland, and Quakers in Pennsylvania. The 

vacant spaces of America offered plenty of room for all who 

would worship God in their own way. The New World became 

a refuge from the intolerance of the Old. 



66. The Protestant Reformation 

The Reformation has a place beside the revival of literature, 
art, and science, the development of invention, and the progress 
of geographical discovery, among the great move- u ature f 
ments ushering in the modern world. It involved, the Refor- 
as we shall learn, a decisive break with both the 
teachings of the Church and the authority of the Papacy. 

There were several causes of the Reformation. Politically, 
it expressed the opposition of European sovereigns to the secular 
authoritv wielded by the Church. 1 Having tri- _ . , , 

... . • 1 j Political and 

umphed over feudalism, the sovereigns wished to economic 

bring the Church, as well, within their jurisdiction. causes of tha 
' ..... Reformation 

They tried to restrict the privileges of ecclesiastical 

courts, to impose taxes on the clergy, as on their own subjects, 
and to dictate the appointment of bishops and abbots to office. 
The result was constant friction between Church and State in 
one European country after another. Economically, the Refor- 
mation voiced a protest, on the part of both upper and lower 
classes, against the increasing luxury and extravagance of the 
papal court. 2 The protest rang loudest in Germany, when there 
was no strong king to prohibit the drainage of money to Rome, 
as French and English rulers had done. 

1 See page 205. - Sec page 213. 



2 5 8 



The Renaissance 



The political and economic causes of the Reformation com- 
bined with those strictly religious in character. Thoughtful men 
T> u,rj^,<, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries had criti- 

Religious 

causes of the cized the worldliness of the Church, as reflected in 

e orma ion ^g ij ves { man y f its officers, and had urged that 

even popes, cardinals, and bishops should imitate the poverty of 

the Apostles. Some reformers, such as John Wycliffe in England 

and John Huss in Bohemia, 
went much further and 
demanded wholesale 
changes in Catholic belief 
and worship. The views 
of Wycliffe and Huss were 
now to be expressed in 
Germany during the six- 
teenth century by the real 
founder of the Reforma- 
tion, Martin Luther. 

Luther was the son of a 
German peasant, who, by 
Martin industry and 

Luther frugality, had 

gained a small competence. 
Thanks to his father's self- 
sacrifice, Luther received 
a good education in theol- 
ogy and philosophy at the University of Erfurt. He took 
the degrees of bachelor and master of arts and then began to 
study law, but an acute sense of his sinfulness and a desire to 
save his soul soon drove him into a monastery. A few years 
later Luther visited Rome, only to be shocked by the general 
laxity of life in the capital of the Papacy. After returning 
to Germany he became a professor of theology in the Uni- 
versity of Wittenberg, where his sermons and lectures attracted 
large audiences. 

Luther's reforming career began with an attack upon the 
indulgence system as found in Germany. An indulgence is a 




Martin Luther 

A portrait by Lucas Cranach the Elder of Luther 
in 1526. Now in the possession of Richard von 
Kaufmann, Berlin. 



I 

The Protestant Reformation 259 

letter of pardon relieving a truly penitent sinner from some or 
all of the penances (punishments) which the Church would 
otherwise impose upon him. Its benefits are also ap- The Ninety- 
plied to the souls of the dead in purgatory. During five Thcses 
the Middle Ages the pope granted indulgences to crusaders, 
pilgrims, and to those who contributed money for a pious object, 
such as the erection of a church or a convent. Many German 
princes opposed this method of raising funds for the Church, 
because it took so much money out of their dominions. Luther 
condemned it on religious grounds, pointing out that common 
people, who could not understand the Latin in which indulgen- 
ces were written, often thought that they wiped away the 
penalties of sin, even without true repentance. Luther also 
denied the efficacy of indulgences for souls in purgatory. These 
and other criticisms were set forth by him in ninety-five theses 
or propositions, which he offered to defend against all opponents. 
In accordance with the custom of medieval scholars, Luther 
posted the theses on the door of the church at Wittenberg, where 
all might see them. They were composed in Latin, but were at 
once translated into German, printed, and spread broadcast over 
Germany. Their effect was so great that before long the grant- 
ing of indulgences in that country almost ceased. 

The pope, at first, had paid little attention to the controversy 
about indulgences, declaring it a "mere squabble of monks," 
but he now issued a bull against Luther, ordering Diet of 
him to recant within sixty days or be excommuni- Worms > x S2i 
cated. The papal bull did not frighten Luther or withdraw from 
him popular support. He burnt it in the market square of Wit- 
tenberg, in the presence of a concourse of students and towns- 
folk. This dramatic action deeply stirred all Germany. The 
pope then urged the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, to put 
Luther under the ban of the empire. Charles was willing to 
comply, but the German princes insisted that Luther must not 
be condemned unheard. Accordingly, Luther was summoned 
before a great assembly (Diet) of princes and ecclesiastical dig- 
nitaries at Worms. Here he refused to retract anything he had 
written, unless his statements could be shown to contradict 



e iiau 
:l the 



260 



The Renaissance 



Bible. ' It is neither right nor safe to act against conscience, " 
Luther said. " God help me. Amen. " 

The Diet of Worms proclaimed Luther a heretic and outlaw, 
but his friends spirited him away to the castle of the Wartburg. 
Luther's He remained in seclusion for many months, en- 

leadership gaged upon a translation of the Bible. Though 
still under the ban of the empire, Luther now returned to Witten- 




:#*§ 



Worms Cathedral 

The old German city of Worms possesses in the Cathedral of SS. Peter and Paul one of 
the finest Romanesque structures in Europe. The exterior, with its four round towers, two 
large domes, and a choir at each end, is particularly imposing. The cathedral was mainly 
built in the twelfth century. 

berg and devoted himself to the reformatory movement. His 
translation of the Bible, simple, forcible, and easy to under- 
stand, enjoyed wide popularity and helped to fix for Germans 
the form of their literary language. Luther also composed 
many fine hymns and a catechism, flooded the country 
with pamphlets, and wrote innumerable letters to his ad- 
herents. He became in this way the leader of the German 
Reformation. 



The Protestant Reformation 261 

The Reformation in Germany made a wide appeal. To 
patriotic Germans it seemed a revolt against a foreign power — 
the Italian Papacy. To men of pious mind it The (iRe _ 
offered the attractions of a simple faith based formed 
directly on the Bible. Worldly-minded princes e gl0n 
saw in it an opportunity to despoil the Church of lands and 
revenues. Luther's teachings, accordingly, found acceptance 
among many people. Priests married, monks left their monas- 
teries, and the "Reformed Religion" took the place of Roman 
Catholicism in most parts of northern and central Germany. 
South Germany, however, did not fall away from the pope and 
has remained Roman Catholic to the present time. 

Luther's doctrines also spread into Scandinavian lands. 
The rulers of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden closed Lutheranism 
the monasteries and compelled the Roman Cath- in Scandi- 
olic bishops to surrender ecclesiastical property to 
the Crown. Lutheranism became henceforth the official religion 
of these three countries. 

The Reformation in Switzerland began with Huldreich 
Zwingli. He was the contemporary, but not the disciple, of 
Luther. From his pulpit in the cathedral of Zurich, Huldreich 
Zwingli proclaimed the Scriptures as the sole guide Zwm g u 
of faith and denied the supremacy of the pope. Many of the 
Swiss cantons accepted his teaching and broke away from 
obedience to Rome. 

Another founder of Protestantism was the Frenchman, John 
Calvin. His Institutes of the Christian Religion set forth in 
orderly, logical manner the main principles of 
Protestant theology. He also translated the Bible 
into French and wrote commentaries on nearly all the Scriptural 
books. Calvin passed most of his life at Geneva. The men 
whom he trained there, and on whom he set the stamp of his 
stern, earnest, God-fearing character, spread Calvinism over a 
great part of Europe. In Holland and Scotland it became the 
prevailing type of Protestantism, and in France and in England 
it deeply affected the national life. During the seventeenth 
century the Puritans carried Calvinism across the sea to 



262 The Renaissance 

New England, where it formed the dominant faith in colonial 
times. 

The Reformation in Germany and Switzerland started as a 
national and popular movement; in England it began as the 
Beginning of act °^ a despotic sovereign, Henry VIII, the second 
the English king of the Tudor dynasty. He broke with the 
pope because the latter would not consent to his 
divorce from his queen, Catherine of Aragon, who was the aunt 
of the Holy Roman Emperor and Spanish monarch, Charles V. 
Henry VIII finally obtained the desired divorce from an English 
court, and in defiance of the papal bull of excommunication 
married a pretty maid-in- waiting, named Anne Boleyn. The 
king's next step was to secure from his subservient Parliament 
a series of laws abolishing the pope's authority in England. An 
Act of Supremacy (1534) declared the English king to be "the 
only supreme head on earth of the Church of England," with 
power to appoint all ecclesiastical officers and dispose of the 
papal revenues. The suppression of the monasteries and the 
appropriation of their wealth for himself and his favorites soon 
followed this legislation. While Henry VIII thus separated 
England from the control of the Papacy, he remained Roman 
Catholic in belief to the day of his death. 

The Reformation made rapid progress in England during the 

reign of Henry's son and successor, Edward VI. The young 

, . king's guardian allowed reformers from the Conti- 

Completion 00 _,.,,,,. 

of the Eng- nent to come to England, and the doctrines of 

lishRefor- Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin were freely preached 

there. In order that religious services might be 

conducted in the language of the people, Archbishop Cranmer 

and his co-workers prepared the Book of Common Prayer. It 

consisted of translations into noble English of various parts of 

the old Latin service books. With some changes, it is still 

used in the Church of England and the Protestant Episcopal 

Church of the United States. The short reign of Mary Tudor, 

daughter of Catherine of Aragon, was marked by a temporary 

setback to the Protestant cause. The queen prevailed on 

Parliament to secure a reconciliation with Rome. She also 



The Protestant Sects 263 

married her Roman Catholic cousin, Philip II of Spain, the son 
of Charles V. Mary now began a severe persecution of the 
Protestants. Many eminent reformers perished, among them 
Cranmer, the former archbishop. Mary died childless, after 
ruling about five years, and the crown passed to Anne 
Boleyn's daughter, Elizabeth. Under Elizabeth Anglicanism 
again replaced Roman Catholicism as the religion of England. 

67. The Protestant Sects 

The Reformation was practically completed before the close 
of the sixteenth century. In 1500 the Roman Church embraced 
all Europe west of Russia and the Balkan Peninsula. Extent of 
By 1600 nearly half of its former subjects had Protestant- 
renounced their allegiance. The greater part of 
Germany and Switzerland and all of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, 
Holland, England, Wales, and Scotland became independent of 
the Papacy. The unity of western Christendom, which had been 
preserved throughout the Middle Ages, thus disappeared and 
has not since been revived. 

The reformers agreed in substituting for the authority of 

popes and church councils the authority of the Bible. They 

went back fifteen hundred years to the time of _ 

Common 
the Apostles and tried to restore what they believed features of 

to be apostolic Christianity. Hence they rejected protestant- 
such doctrines and practices as were supposed to 
have developed during the Middle Ages. These included belief 
in purgatory, veneration of relics, invocation of saints, devotion 
to the Virgin, indulgences, pilgrimages, and the greater number 
of the sacraments. The Reformation also abolished the mon- 
astic system and priestly celibacy. The sharp distinction 
between clergy and laity disappeared; for priests married, lived 
among the people, and no longer formed a separate class. In 
general, Protestantism affirmed the ability of every man to 
find salvation without the aid of ecclesiastics. The Church 
was no longer the only "gate of heaven." l 

1 See page 204. 



264 



The Renaissance 




Extent of the Reformation, 1524-1572 a.d. 



But the Protestant idea of authority led inevitably to dif- 
ferences of opinion among the reformers. There were various 
Divisions ways of interpreting that Bible to which they 
among appealed as the rule of faith and conduct. Conse- 

quently, Protestantism split up into many sects 
or denominations, and these have gone on multiplying to the 
present day. Nearly all, however, are offshoots from the three 
main varieties of Protestantism which appeared in the sixteenth 
century. 

Lutheranism and Anglicanism presented some features in 
common. Both were state churches, supported by the govern- 
ment; both had a book of common prayer; and both recog- 



The Protestant Sects 265 

nized the sacraments of baptism, the Eucharist, and confirma- 
tion. The Church of England also kept the sacra- L Utneran _ 
ment of ordination. The Lutheran churches in ism and An- 
Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, as well as the glcamsm 
Church of England, likewise retained the episcopate. 

Calvinism departed much more widely from Roman Catholi- 
cism. It did away with the episcopate and had only one order 

of clergv — the presbvters. 1 It provided for a _ . . . 

■ i r ' 1 • /-!!••• Calvinism 

very simple form of worship. In a Calvmistic 

church the service consisted of Bible reading, a sermon, ex- 
temporaneous prayers, and hymns sung by the congregation. 
The Calvinists kept only two sacraments, baptism and the 
Eucharist. They regarded the first, however, as a simple under- 
taking to bring up the child in a Christian manner, and the 
sacond as merely a commemoration of the Last Supper. 

The break with Rome did not introduce religious liberty into 
Europe. Nothing was further from the mind of Luther, Calvin, 
and other reformers than the toleration of beliefs 

..... _, , _ The Refor- 

unhke their own. The early Protestant sects mation and 
punished dissenters as zealously as the Roman freedom of 
Church punished heretics. Lutherans burned the 
followers of Zwingli in Germany, Calvinists put non-Calvinists 
to death, and the English government, in the time of Henry 
VIII and Elizabeth, executed many Roman Catholics. Com- 
plete freedom of conscience and the right of private judgment 
in religion have been secured in most countries of Europe only 
within the last hundred years. 

The Reformation, however, did deepen the moral life of 
European peoples. The faithful Protestant or Roman Catholic 
tried to show by his conduct that his particular The Re f or _ 
form of belief made for better living than any mation and 
other faith. The impulse to higher standards of mora s 
morality, which we owe to the Reformation, is still felt at the 
present day. 



1 Churches governed by assemblies of presbyters were called Presbyterian; those 
which allowed each congregation to rule itself were called Congregational. 



266 



The Renaissance 



68. The Catholic Counter Reformation 

The rapid spread of Protestantism soon brought about a 
Catholic Counter Reformation in those parts of Europe which 
The reform- remained faithful to Rome. The popes now turned 
ing popes from the cultivation of Renaissance art and litera- 
ture to the defense of their threatened faith. They made 
needed changes in the papal court and appointed to ecclesiastical 

offices men distinguished for virtue 
and learning. This reform of the 
Papacy dates from the time of 
Paul III, who became pope in 1534. 
Still more important was his sup- 
port of the Society of Jesus, which 
had been established in the year of 
his accession to the papal throne. 

The founder of the new society 
was a Spanish nobleman, Ignatius 
St. Ignatius Loyola. He had seen 
Loyola a g OOC j deal of service 

in the wars of Charles V against the 
French. While in a hospital re- 
covering from a wound, Loyola 
read devotional books, and these 




St. Ignatius Loyola 



After the painting by Sanchez de 

Coeiio in the House of the Society of produced a profound change within 

Jesus at Madrid. No authentic portrait hi m JJ e now donned a beggar's 
of Loyola has been preserved. Coello's . . 

picture was made with the aid of a wax robe, practiced all the kinds of 
cast of the saint's features taken after asceticism which his books de- 
scribed, and went on a pilgrimage 
to Jerusalem. Still later he became a student of theology at 
Paris, where he met the six devout and talented men who 
became the first members of his society. They intended to 
work as missionaries among the Moslems, but, when this plan 
fell through, they visited Rome and placed their energy and 
enthusiasm at the disposal of the pope. 

Loyola's military training deeply affected the character of 
the new order. The Jesuits, as their Protestant opponents 



The Catholic Counter Reformation 267 

styled them, were to form an army of spiritual soldiers, living 
under the strictest obedience to their head, or general. Like sol- 
diers, again, they were to remain in the world and The Society 
there fight manfully for the Church and against of J esus 
heretics. The society grew rapidly; before Loyola's death it 
included over a thousand members; and in the seventeenth 
century it became the most influential of all the religious orders. 
The activity of the Jesuits as preachers, confessors, teachers, 
and missionaries did much to roll back the rising tide of Protes- 
tantism in Europe. 

The Jesuits gave special attention to education, for they 
realized the importance of winning over the young people to the 
Church. Their schools were so good that even Jesuit 
Protestant children often attended them. The scnools 
popularity of Jesuit teachers arose partly from the fact that 
they always tried to lead, not drive, their pupils. Light punish- 
ments, short lessons, many holidays, and a liberal use of prizes 
and other distinctions formed some of the attractive features 
of their system of training. It is not surprising that the Jesuits 
became the instructors of the Roman Catholic world. They 
called their colleges the "fortresses of the faith." 

The missions of the Jesuits were not less important than their 
schools. The Jesuits worked in Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, 
and other countries where Protestantism threatened Jesuit 
to become dominant. Then they invaded all the missionaries 
lands which the great maritime discoveries had laid open 
to European enterprise. In India, China, the East Indies, 
Japan, the Philippines, Africa, and the two Americas their 
converts from heathenism were numbered by hundreds of 
thousands. 

Another agency in the Counter Reformation was the great. 
Church Council summoned by Pope Paul III. The council 
met at Trent, on the borders of Germany and Italy, council of 
It continued, with intermissions, for nearly twenty Trent, 154s- 
years. The Protestants, though invited to par- I5 3 
ticipate, did not attend, and hence nothing could be done to 
bring them back within the Roman Catholic fold. This was 



268 The Renaissance 

the last general council of the Church for more than three 
hundred years. 1 

The Council of Trent made no essential changes in Roman 
Catholic doctrines, which remained as theologians had set 
Work of them forth in the Middle Ages. It declared that 

the council foe tradition of the Church possessed equal 
authority with the Bible and reaffirmed the supremacy of the 
pope over Christendom. The council also passed decrees for- 
bidding the sale of ecclesiastical offices and requiring bishops 
and other prelates to attend strictly to their duties. Since the 
Council of Trent the Roman Church has been distinctly a 
religious organization, instead of both a secular and a religious 
body, as was the Church in the Middle Ages. 

The council, before adjourning, authorized the pope to draw 

up a list of works which Roman Catholics might not read. 

_, „ . This action did not form an innovation. The 

The Index 

Church from an early day had condemned heretical 
writings. However, the invention of printing, by giving greater 
currency to new and dangerous ideas, seemed to increase the 
necessity for the regulation of thought. The "Index of Pro- 
hibited Books" still exists, and additions to the list are made 
from time to time. It was matched by the strict censorship 
of printing long maintained in Protestant countries. 

Still another agency of the Counter Reformation consisted of 
the Inquisition. This was a system of church courts for the 
The Inqui- discovery and punishment of heretics. Such 
sition courts had been set up in the Middle Ages. After 

the Council of Trent they redoubled their activity, especially 
in Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain. The Inquisition probably 
contributed to the disappearance of Protestantism in Italy. 
In the Netherlands, where it worked with great severity, it 
only aroused exasperation and hatred and helped to provoke 
a successful revolt of the Dutch people. The Spaniards, on the 

1 Until the Vatican Council (i 869-1 870), which promulgated the dogma of papal 
infallibility. The dogma means that when the pope speaks ex cathedra, that is, by 
virtue of his apostolic authority, on matters of faith and morals, he cannot err. 
His decisions, therefore, bind the whole Church. 



The Religious Wars 269 

other hand, approved of the methods of the Inquisition and 
welcomed its extermination of heretics. The Spanish Inquisition 
was not abolished until the nineteenth century. 

69. The Religious Wars 

The young man who as Holy Roman Emperor presided at the 
Diet of Worms had assumed the imperial crown only two years 
previously. A namesake of Charlemagne, Charles 
V held sway over dominions even more extensive Holy Roman 
than those which had belonged to the Frankish Em P eror » 
king. Through his mother, a daughter of Ferdi- 
nand and Isabella, he inherited Spain, Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, 
and the Spanish possessions in the New World. Through his 
father, he received the Netherlands and the extensive possessions 
of the Hapsburgs in central Europe. Charles V, as a devout 
Roman Catholic, felt no sympathy with Lutheranism and might 
easily have extinguished it, had he undertaken the task promptly. 
A revolt in Spain and wars with the French and the Ottoman 
Turks led, however, to his long absence from Germany and 
kept him from proceeding effectively against the Lutherans 
until it was too late. The emperor, finally, brought Spanish 
troops into Germany, but the Lutheran princes were now too 
strong for him. Civil war raged until 1555, when both sides 
agreed to the Peace of Augsburg. It was a compromise. The 
ruler of each state — Germany then contained over three hun- 
dred states — was to decide whether his subjects should be 
Lutherans or Catholics. The peace by no means established re- 
ligious toleration, since all Germans had to believe as their prince 
believed. However, it recognized Lutheranism as a legal religion 
and ended the attempts to crush the German Reformation. 

Soon after the peace of Augsburg, Charles V determined to 
abdicate his many crowns and seek the repose of a monastery. 
The plan was duly carried into effect. His brother, _, ... _ 

11 i-i Philip II, 

Ferdinand I, succeeded to the title of Holy Roman king of 
Emperor and the Austrian territories, while his s P a » n > x ss6- 
son, Philip II, received the Spanish possessions in 
Italy, Sicily, the Netherlands, and America. There were now 



270 The Renaissance 

two branches of the Hapsburg family — one in Austria and 
one in Spain. Philip II, the new king of Spain, aimed to make 
his country the foremost state in the world and to secure the 
triumph of Roman Catholicism over Protestantism. Though 
he had vast possessions, enormous revenues, mighty fleets, and 
armies reputed the best of the age, he could not dominate 
western Europe. His first defeat was in the Netherlands. 

The Netherlands were too near Germany not to be affected 
by the Reformation. Lutheranism soon appeared there, only to 
Protestant- encounter the hostility of Charles V, who intro- 
ism in the duced the terrors of the Inquisition. Many heretics 
were burned at the stake, or beheaded, or buried 
alive. But there is no seed like martyrs' blood. The number of 
Protestants swelled, rather than lessened, especially after 
Calvinism entered the Netherlands. 

In spite of the cruel treatment of heretics by Charles V, the 
Netherlanders remained loyal to the emperor, because he had 
Philip 11 been born and reared among them and always 

and the considered their country as his own. Philip II, 

a Spaniard by birth and sympathies, seemed to 
them, however, only a foreign master. The new ruler did 
nothing to conciliate the people, but governed them despotically 
through Spanish officials supported by Spanish garrisons. 
Arbitrary taxes were levied, cities and nobles were deprived of 
their cherished privileges, and the activity of the Inquisition 
was redoubled. Philip intended to exercise in the Netherlands 
the same absolute power enjoyed by him in Spain. His policies 
soon produced a revolt of both Roman Catholics and Protestants 
against Spanish oppression. 

The southern provinces of the Netherlands, mainly Roman 
Catholic in population, did not long continue their resistance. 
Separation They effected a reconciliation with Philip and 
of the continued for over two centuries to remain in 

et eran s jjapg^uj-g hands. Modern Belgium has grown 
out of them. The seven northern provinces, where Dutch was 
the language and Protestantism the religion, came together in 
1579 in the Union of Utrecht. Two years later they declared 



The Religious Wars 



271 



(ENGLAND 




Hook of aollak^^ii^gyy^^^i~^<. , ' 








The Netherlands at the Truce of 1609 a.d. 

their independence of Spain. In this way the Dutch Re- 
public of the United Netherlands, or simply "Holland," took 
its place among European nations. 



272 The Renaissance 

The struggle of Holland against Spain forms one of the notable 
episodes in history. The Dutch, under a resourceful leader, 
Holland William, Prince of Orange, better known as 

and Spain William the Silent, fought stubbornly behind the 
walls of their cities and on more than one occasion repelled the 
enemy by cutting the dikes and letting in the sea. Philip's 
successor consented in 1609 to a twelve years' truce with the 
revolted provinces, but their freedom was not recognized offi- 
cially by Spain until many years later. 

The long struggle bound the Dutch together and made them 
one nation. During the seventeenth century they took a 
The Dutch prominent part in European affairs. The republic 
Republic which they founded ought to be of special interest 

to Americans. Holland had the earliest system of common 
schools supported by taxation, early adopted the principles of 
religious toleration and freedom of the press, and in the Union 
of Utrecht gave to the world the first written constitution of a 
modern state. The Dutch, indeed, were pioneers of modern 
democracy. 

The attempt of Philip II to conquer England, a stronghold of 
Protestantism under Queen Elizabeth, 1 likewise ended disas- 
Philip II and trously. It must be admitted that Philip could 
Queen plead strong justification for his hostility. Eliza- 

beth allowed English " sea-dogs," such as Sir 
Francis Drake, to plunder Spanish colonies and seize Spanish 
vessels laden with the treasures of the New World. ' Moreover, 
she aided the rebellious Dutch, at first secretly and at length 
openly, in their struggle against Spain. Philip put up with 
these aggressions for many years, but finally came to the con- 
clusion that he could never subdue the Netherlands or end the 
piracy and smuggling in Spanish America without first conquer- 
ing England. Philip seems to have believed that, as soon as a 
Spanish army landed on the island, the Roman Catholics there 
would rally to his cause. But the Spanish king never had a chance 
to verify his belief; the decisive battle took place on the sea. 

1 See page 263. 




PHILIP II 

After the painting by Titian in the Prado Museum, Madrid 




QUEEN ELIZABETH 

After the painting by Zucchero 



The Religious Wars 



273 



Philip had not completed his preparations before Sir Francis 
Drake sailed into Cadiz harbor and destroyed a vast amount of 
The "invinci- nava l stores and shipping. This exploit, which 
bie Arma- Drake called "singeing the king of Spain's beard," 
delayed the expedition for a year. The " Invincible 
Armada" l set out at last in 1588. The Spanish vessels, though 
somewhat larger than those of the English, were inferior in 




The Spanish Armada in the English Channel 

One of a series of engravings of a tapestry (now destroyed) in the House of Lords. In the 
left foreground Drake's ship is shown cutting out a Spanish man-of-war. 

number, speed, and gunnery to their adversaries, while the 
Spanish officers, mostly unused to the sea, were no match for 
men like Drake, Frobisher, and Raleigh, the best mariners of the 
age. The Armada suffered severely in a nine-days' fight in the 
Channel, and many vessels which escaped the English guns 
met shipwreck off the Scotch and Irish coasts. Less than half 
of the Armada returned in safety to Spain. 

England in the later Middle Ages had been an important 
naval power. During the sixteenth century, however, she was 
over-matched by Spain, especially after the annexation of 



Armada was a Spanish name for any armed fleet. 



274 



The Renaissance 



Portugal, by Philip II, added the naval forces of that country 
to the Spanish fleets. 1 The defeat of the Armada showed that 
English a new people had arisen to claim the supremacy of 

sea-power ^ e ocean . Henceforth the English began to build 
up what was to be a sea-power greater than any other known 

to history. 

The French Protes- 
tants, or Huguenots, 
The naturally 

Huguenots accepted 
the doctrines of Calvin, 
who was himself a 
Frenchman and whose 
books were written in 
the French language. 
Though bitterly perse- 
cuted, the Huguenots 
gained a large follow- 
ing, especially among 
a the prosperous middle 
\ class of the towns. 
\ Many nobles also be- 
came Huguenots, some- 
times because of relig- 
ious conviction, but 
often because the new 
movement offered them 
an opportunity to re- 
cover their feudal independence and to plunder the estates of the 
Church. In France, as well as in Germany, the Reformation had 
its worldly side. 

During most of the second half of the sixteenth century, fierce 
The Hugue- conflicts raged in France between the Roman Cath- 
notwars olics and the Huguenots. Philip II aided the 

former, and Queen Elizabeth gave some assistance to the latter. 




Henry IV 

After an old engraving. The king wears a hat 
with plumes and an aigrette, a ruff, and an embroid- 
ered cloak. On his breast is the order of Saint Esprit. 



1 Portugal separated from Spain in 1640 and has since remained an independent 
state. 



The Religious Wars 275 

France suffered terribly in the struggle, not only from the 
constant fighting, but also from the pillage, burnings, and 
other barbarities in which both sides indulged. The Huguenot 
wars ended during the reign of Henry IV, the first of the Bour- 
bon kings. Though originally a Protestant, he became a 
Roman Catholic, in order to conciliate the great majority of his 
subjects. 

King Henry did not break with the Huguenots, however. He 
now issued in their interest the celebrated Edict of Nantes. The 
Huguenots henceforth were to enjoy freedom of Edict of 
private worship everywhere in France, and freedom Nantes » x 598 
to worship publicly in a large number of villages and towns. 
Only Roman Catholic services, however, might be held in Paris 
and at the royal court. Though the edict did not grant com- 
plete religious liberty, it marked an important step in that 
direction. A great European state had recognized for the first 
time the principle that two rival faiths might exist peaceably 
side by side within its borders. 

The Peace of Augsburg gave repose to Germany for more than 
sixty years, but it did not form a complete settlement of the 
religious question in that country. There was still R e Ugious 
room for bitter disputes, especially over the owner- antagonism 
ship of Church property which had been secularized m ermany 
in the course of the Reformation. Furthermore, the peace recog- 
nized only Roman Catholics and Lutherans and allowed no 
rights whatever to the large body of Calvinists. The failure of 
Lutherans and Calvinists to cooperate weakened German 
Protestantism just at the period when the Counter Reformation 
inspired Roman Catholicism with fresh energy and enthusiasm. 

Politics, as well as religion, also made for dissension. The 
Roman Catholic party relied for support on the Hapsburg 
emperors, who wished to unite the German states p i[ t j ca j 
under their control, thus restoring the Holy Roman friction in 
Empire to its former proud position in the affairs erman y 
of Europe. The Protestant princes, on the other hand, wanted 
to become independent sovereigns. Hence they resented all 
efforts to extend the imperial authority over them. 



276 



The Renaissance 



War, 1618 

1648 



Religious antagonism and political friction together produced 
the Thirty Years' War. It was not so much a single conflict in 
Thirty Years' Germany as a series of conflicts, which ultimately 
involved nearly all western Europe. At one time 
Sweden took a prominent part in the struggle, 
under her heroic king, Gustavus Adolphus, who came to the 

aid of the Protestant 
princes against the 
Holy Roman Em- 
peror. After the 
death of Gustavus 
Adolphus in battle, 
the German Protes- 
tants found an ally, 
strangely enough, in 
Cardinal Richelieu, 
the all-powerful 
minister of the 
French king. Riche- 
lieu entered the 
struggle in order to 
humble the Austrian 
Hapsburgs and ex- 
tend the boundaries 
of France toward 
the Rhine. Since the 
Spanish Hapsburgs 
were aiding their 
Austrian kinsmen, 
Richelieu naturally 
fought against Spain also. The Holy Roman Emperor had to 
yield at last and consented to the treaties of peace signed at 
two cities in the province of Westphalia. 

The Peace of Westphalia ended the long series of wars which 
Peace of followed the Reformation. Il practically settled 

Westphalia foe religious question, for it put Roman Catholics, 
Lutherans, and Calvinists in Germany all on the same footing. 




Henry VIII 

After a portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger. 



The Religious Wars 277 

Henceforth the idea that religious differences should be settled 
by force gradually passed away from the minds of men. The 
territorial readjustments made at this time have deeply affected 
the subsequent history of Europe. France received from the 
Holy Roman Empire a large part of Alsace, in this way obtaining 
a foothold on the upper Rhine. She also secured the recognition 
of her claims to the bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun in 
Lorraine. Sweden gained the western half of Pomerania and the 
bishopric of Bremen. These possessions enabled her to control 
the mouths of the rivers Oder, Elbe, and Weser, which were 
important arteries of German commerce. Brandenburg — the 
future kingdom of Prussia — acquired eastern Pomerania and 
several bishoprics, thus becoming the leading state in North 
Germany. The independence of Switzerland and of the United 
Netherlands was also recognized. 

During the Thirty Years' War Germany had seen most of the 
fighting. She suffered from it to the point of exhaustion. The 
population dwindled from about sixteen millions Condition 
to one-half, or, as some believe, to one-third that of German y 
number. The loss of life was partly due to fearful epidemics, 
such as typhus fever and the bubonic plague, which spread 
over the land in the wake of the invading armies. A great 
many villages were destroyed or were abandoned by their 
inhabitants. Much of the soil went out of cultivation, while 
trade and manufacturing nearly disappeared. Added to all 
this was the decline of education, literature, and art, and the 
brutalizing of the people in mind and morals. It took Germany 
at least one hundred years to recover from the injury inflicted 
by the Thirty Years' War; complete recovery, indeed, came 
only in the nineteenth century. 

The savagery displayed by all participants in this long contest 
naturally impressed thinking men with the necessity of formu- 
lating rules to protect non-combatants, to care for Rise of inter- 
prisoners, and to do away with pillage and massa- natl0nal ,aw 
ere. The worst horrors of the war had not taken place before a 
Dutch jurist, named Hugo Grotius, published at Paris in 1625 
a work On (he Laws of War and Peace. It may be said to have 



278 



The Renaissance 



founded international law. The success of the book was re- 
markable. Gustavus Adolphus carried a copy about with him 
during his campaigns, and its leading doctrines were recognized 
and acted upon in the Peace of Westphalia. Since the time 
of Grotius, the field of international law has widened, and now 
not only the regulation of warfare, but also the preservation of 

peace has become the ideal 
of statesmen, publicists, and 
all lovers of mankind. 

70. The European State 
System 

After the Peace of West- 
phalia statesmen generally 
Balance agreed that the 
of power various European 
nations unequal in size, popu- 
lation, and resources, ought 
to form a sort of federal 
community in which the secu- 
rity of all was ensured. If 
any nation became so power- 
ful as to overshadow the 
others, then they must com- 
bine against it and endeavor to hold it in check. The main- 
tenance of such a balance of power has been a leading object of 
European diplomacy from the time of the Thirty Years' War 
to the present day. 

But the balance of power remained only a weak ideal, in 
an age when diplomacy was corrupt and international immor- 
National ality was universal. The strong countries often 

aggrandize- robbed their weaker neighbors with impunity. 
The result was that the vanity, selfishness, or 
ambition of individual rulers and dynasties plunged Europe 
into one war after another. Henceforth, national aggrandizement 
began to replace religious dissension as the main cause of 
European strife. 




Hugo Grotius 

After the portrait by Miervelt of Grotius at 
the age of forty-nine. 



The European State System 279 

The map of western Europe in 1648 was very much the same 
as now. The British Isles had a common ruler, but Scotland 
continued to be a separate kingdom and Ireland Western 
was only loosely joined to England. The Iberian Eur °P e 
Peninsula included the two kingdoms of Spain and Portugal. 
Both were declining in wealth, population, and political 
importance. France had nearly her existing boundaries, except 
on the east and northeast toward the Rhine. Switzerland and 
the United Netherlands (Holland) were independent confeder- 
ations. The Spanish Netherlands (Belgium) remained, how- 
ever, a province of Spain. 

The map of central Europe in 1648 was very unlike what it is 
to-day. Most of Germany was then divided into more than three 
hundred states and feudal domains. Many of Central 
them were free to coin money, raise armies, make Eur °P e 
war, and negotiate treaties without consulting the Holy Roman 
Emperor. The imperial title and dignity were now hereditary 
in the Austrian Hapsburg family. If they meant little, the 
Hapsburg ruler, as archduke of Austria, king of Bohemia, king 
of Hungary, and lord of many smaller territories, held, neverthe- 
less, a proud position in Europe. Italy, like Germany, presented 
a picture of disunion. The northern part of the peninsula con- 
tained the independent duchy of Savoy, the duchy of Milan 
(a Spanish possession), the republics of Venice and Genoa, and 
the little states of Parma, Modena, and Lucca. Central Italy 
included the duchy of Tuscany and the States of the Church. 
The kingdom of the Two Sicilies belonged to Spain. 

In 1648 there were only two Scandinavian kingdoms, for 
Norway was joined to Denmark. Sweden, then a first-class 
power, held sway over Finland and adjacent terri- Northern 
tories. The duchy of East Prussia belonged to and eastern 
the Elector of Brandenburg. The huge kingdom urope 
of Poland, which had united with the grand duchy of Lithuania 
in the preceding century, stretched from the Baltic almost to 
the Black Sea. Farther east lay Russia, so backward in civiliza- 
tion as to be scarcely a European country. 

The Ottoman Turks in 1648 ruled in southeastern Europe. 



280 The Renaissance 

They occupied Greece, all the Balkan Peninsula except Monte- 
negro, most of Hungary, and the territory now included in 
Southeast- Rumania and part of southern Russia. Never 
em Europe ^ a( j ^ e shadow of the crescent loomed more 
darkly over Europe. 

Studies 

i. Distinguish and define the three terms, "Renaissance," "Revival of Learn- 
ing," and "Humanism." 2. "Next to the discovery of the New World, the recovery 
of the ancient world is the second landmark that divides us from the Middle Ages 
and marks the transition to modern life." Comment on this statement. 3. Why 
did the Renaissance begin as an "Italian event"? 4. Why was the revival of Greek 
more important in the history of civilization than the revival of Latin? 5. Show 
that printing was an "emancipating force." 6. Why did the classical scholar come 
to be regarded as the only educated man? 7. Why has Marco Polo been called the 
"Columbus of the East Indies"? 8. Explain this statement: "The American 
isthmus was discovered because an Asiatic one existed; in trying to avoid Suez the 
early mariners ran afoul of Darien." g. On an outline map indicate the voyages 
of discovery of Vasco da Gama, Columbus (first voyage), and Magellan. 10. How 
did Lisbon in the sixteenth century become the commercial successor of Venice? 
11. Show that the three words "gospel, glory, and gold" sum up the principal 
motives of European colonization in the sixteenth century. 12. Compare the 
motives which led to the colonization of the New World with those which led to 
Greek colonization. 13. "The opening-up of the Atlantic to continuous exploration 
is the most momentous step in the history of man's occupation of the earth." Does 
this statement seem to be justified? 14. Identify the following dates: 1517, 1555, 
1588, 1598, and 1648. 15. On the map, page 264, trace the geographical extent 
of the Reformation in the sixteenth century. 16. Why did the reformers in each 
country take special pains to translate the Bible into the vernacular? 17. Why 
is the Council of Trent generally considered the most important Church council 
since that of Nicaga? 18. On an outline map indicate the European countries 
ruled by Charles V. 19. Compare the Edict of Nantes with the Peace of Augsburg. 
20. Show that political, as well as religious, motives affected the revolt of the 
Netherlands, the Huguenot wars, and the Thirty Years' War. 

/1 ■ , ' 1 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES 
IN EUROPE 1 

71. Absolutism and the Divine Right of Kings 

Most European states in the seventeenth and eighteenth 

centuries were absolute monarchies. The rulers of Europe, 

having triumphed over the feudal nobility of the 

,,.... i ■ i i i ii i Absolutism 

Middle Ages, proclaimed themselves to be the sole 

source of authority. Absolutism prevailed everywhere on 
the Continent, except in such small states as Holland, Switzer- 
land, and Venice, where aristocracies held the reins of power. 
Democracy was non-existent. The middle and lower classes 
had no real part in law-making, no representative assemblies, 
and no constitutional safeguards against arbitrary authority. 
The kings were everything; their subjects, nothing. 

Absolutism was supported by divine right. The kings 
declared that they held their power, not from the choice or 

consent of their subjects, but by the "grace of 

„,,, rr ... , .... ., _ , Divine right 

God. This theory of divine right first took 

shape during the Middle Ages, out of the controversies between 

the Papacy and the secular rulers of Europe. The popes, as 

God's vicars on earth, claimed the obedience of all Christians, 

as well in temporal as in spiritual matters. Emperors and 

kings, resenting what they regarded as papal interference in 

politics, then set up a counter-claim for the divine origin of the 

imperial and royal power. During the Reformation Luther 

and his followers also exalted the authority of the State against 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modem History, chapter xxv, "Characters 
and Episodes of the Great Rebellion"; chapter xxvi, "Oliver Cromwell"; chapter 
xxvii," English Life and Manners under the Restoration"; chapter xxviii, "Louis 
XIV and His Court." Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 4, "Petition of Right, 
1628"; No. 6, "Instrument of Government, 165V'; No. 7, "Habeas Corpus Act, 
1679"; No. 8, "Bill of Rights, 1689"; No. 9, "Act of Settlement, 1701." 

281 



282 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

the authority of the Church, which they condemned and rejected. 
Providence, they argued, had never sanctioned the Papacy, 
but Providence had really ordained the State and had placed 
over it a ruler whom it was a religious duty to obey. Lutherans, 
therefore, defended the theory of divine right. The same 
may be said of Anglicans, for the Church of England from the 
first was a religion of the State. 

A very different theory found acceptance in those parts of 
Europe where Calvinism prevailed. In his Institutes, one of 
Popular the mos t widely read books of the age, Calvin 

sovereignty declares that magistrates and parliaments are 
the guardians of popular liberty "by the ordinance of God." x 
Calvin's adherents, amplifying this statement, argued that 
rulers derive their authority from the people and that those 
who abuse it may be deposed by the will of the people. The 
Christian duty of resistance to royal tyranny became a cardinal 
principle of Calvinism among the French Huguenots, the Dutch, 
the Scotch, and most of the American colonists of the seven- 
teenth century. We shall now see how influential it was in 
seventeenth-century England. 

72. The Struggle against Stuart Absolutism in England, 
1603-1660 

Absolutism in England dated from the time of the Tudors. 
Henry VII humbled the nobles, while Henry VIII and Elizabeth 
Tudor ab- brought the Church into dependence on the Crown, 
soiutism These three sovereigns, though despotic, were 

excellent rulers and were popular with the influential middle 
class in town and country. The Tudors gave England order 
and prosperity, if not political liberty. 

The English Parliament in the thirteenth century had be- 
come a body representative of the different estates of the 

„ ,. realm, and in the fourteenth century it had sepa- 

Parhament . 1 

under the rated into the two houses of Lords and Commons. 

Tudors Parliament enjoyed considerable authority at 

this time. The kings, who were in continual need of money, 

1 Institutes of the Christian Religion, IV, xx, 31. 



Stuart Absolutism in England 283 

often summoned it, sought its advice upon important ques- 
tions, and readily listened to its requests. The despotic Tudors, 
on the other hand, made Parliament their servant. Henry 
VII called it together on only five occasions during his reign ; 
Henry VIII persuaded or frightened it into doing anything 
he pleased ; and Elizabeth consulted it as infrequently as 
possible. Parliament under the Tudors did not abandon 
its old claims to a share in the government, but it had little 
chance to exercise them. 

The death of Elizabeth in 1603 ended the Tudor dynasty and 
placed James I, 1 the first of the Stuarts, on the English throne. 
England and Scotland were now joined in a per- j ames j 
sonal union, though each country retained its own k^e. 

1603 1625 

Parliament, laws, and established Church. The 
new king was well described by a contemporary as the "wisest 
fool in Christendom." He had a good mind and abundant 
learning, but throughout his reign he showed an utter inability 
to win either the esteem or the affection of his subjects. This 
was a misfortune, for the English had now grown weary of 
despotism and wanted freedom. They were not prepared to 
tolerate in James, an alien, many things which they had over- 
looked in "Good Queen Bess." 

The manifest purpose of James to rule as an absolute monarch 
aroused much opposition in Parliament. That body felt little 
sympathy for a king who proclaimed himself the Parliament 
source of all law. When James, always extrava- and J ames * 
gant and a poor financier, came before it for money, Parliament 
insisted on its right to withhold supplies until grievances were 
redressed. James would not yield, and got along as best he 
could by levying customs duties, selling titles of nobility, and 
imposing excessive fines, in spite of the protests of Parliament. 

A religious controversy helped to embitter the dispute be- 
tween James and Parliament. The king, who was a devout 
Anglican, made himself very unpopular with the Puritans, as 
the reformers within the Church of England were called. The 

1 James VI of Scotland (1567-1625). His mother, Mary Queen of Scots, was a 
granddaughter of Henry VII, the first of the Tudors. 



284 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 



Puritanism 




Puritans had at first no intention of separating from the 
national or established Church, but they wished to "purify" 
it of certain customs which they described as 
"Romish." Among these were the use of the 
surplice, of the ring in the marriage service, and of the sign 

of the cross in baptism. 
Some Puritans wanted 
to get rid of the Book 
of Common Prayer al- 
together. Since the 
Puritans had a large 
majority in the House 
of Commons, it was 
inevitable that the 
parliamentary struggle 
against Stuart absolut- 
ism should assume in 
part a religious char- 
acter. 

The political and religious difficulties which marked the 
reign of James I did not disappear when his son, Charles I, 
came to the throne. Charles was a true Stuart 
in his devotion to absolutism and divine right. 
Almost immediately he began ,to quarrel with 
Parliament. When that body withheld supplies, Charles 
resorted to forced loans from the wealthy and even imprisoned 
a number of persons who refused to contribute. Such arbitrary 
acts showed plainly that Charles would play the tyrant if he could. 
The king's attitude at last led Parliament to a bold assertion 
of its authority. It now presented to Charles the celebrated 
Petition of Petition of Right. One of the most important 
Right, 1628 clauses provided that loans without parliamentary 
sanction should be considered illegal. Another clause de- 
clared that no one should be arrested or imprisoned except 
according to the law of the land. The Petition thus repeated 
and reinforced some of the leading principles of Magna Carta. 1 

1 See page 201. 



A Puritan Family 

Illustration in an edition of the Psalms published 
in 1563- 



Charles I, 
king, 1625 
1649 



Stuart Absolutism in England 285 

The people of England, speaking this time through their elected 

representatives, asserted once more their right to limit the 

power of kings. 

Charles signed the Petition, as the only means of securing 

parliamentary consent to taxation ; but he had no intention of 

observing it. For the next eleven years he man- 

, , . , ..... . John Hamp- 

aged to get along without calling Parliament in den and 

session. One of his devices to fill his treasury " ship "„ 
was the levying of "ship-money." According 
to an old custom, seaboard towns and counties had been re- 
quired to provide ships or money for the royal navy. Charles 
revived this custom and extended it to towns and counties 
lying inland. It seemed clear that the king meant to impose 
a permanent tax on all England without the assent of Parlia- 
ment. The demand for "ship-money" aroused much opposi- 
tion, and John Hampden, a wealthy squire of Buckinghamshire, 
refused to pay the twenty shillings levied on his estate. Hamp- 
den was tried before a court of the royal judges and was con- 
victed by a bare majority. He became, however, a popular hero. 

Archbishop Laud, the king's chief agent in ecclesiastical 
matters, detested Puritanism and aimed to root it out from the 
Anglican Church. He put no Puritans to death, L au a' S 
but he sanctioned cruel punishments of those who ecclesiastical 
would not conform to the established religion. p ° 
While the restrictions on Puritans were increased, those affecting 
Roman Catholics were relaxed. Many people thought that 
Charles, through Laud and the bishops, was preparing to lead 
the Church of England back to Rome. They therefore opposed 
the king on religious grounds, as well as for political reasons. 

But the personal rule of Charles was now drawing to an end. 
When the king tried to introduce a modified form of the English 
prayer book into Scotland, the Scotch Calvinists 
drew up a national oath, or Covenant, by which Parliament, 
they bound themselves to resist any attempt to 16 *° 
change their religion. Rebellion quickly passed into open war, 
and the Covenanters invaded northern England. Charles was 
then obliged to summon Parliament in session. It met in 1640 



286 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

and did not formally dissolve until twenty years later. Hence 

it came to be known as the Long Parliament. This body at once 

assumed the conduct of government. Under the leadership of 

John Hampden, John Pym, and Oliver Cromwell, it proceeded 

to abolish the royal courts which had tried cases arbitrarily 

without a jury. It forbade the imposition of " ship-money " 

and other irregular taxes. It also took away the king's right of 

dissolving Parliament at his pleasure and ordered that at least 

one parliamentary session should be held every three years. 

These measures stripped the Crown of the despotic powers 

acquired by the Tudors and the Stuarts. 

The Long Parliament thus far had acted along the line of 

reformation rather than revolution. Had Charles been content 

to accept the new arrangements, there would have 
Outbreak of , ... . . & _, . . ' 

the Great been little more trouble. JBut the proud and rni- 

Rebeilion, perious king was only watching his chance to strike 
a blow at Parliament. Taking advantage of 
some differences of opinion among its members, Charles sum- 
moned his soldiers, marched to Westminster, and demanded 
the surrender of five leaders, including Pym and Hampden. 
Warned in time, they made their escape, and Charles did not 
find them in the chamber of the Commons. "Well, I see all 
the birds are flown," he exclaimed, and walked out baffled. 
The king's attempt to intimidate the Commons was a grave 
blunder. It showed beyond doubt that he would resort to 
force, rather than bend his neck to Parliament. Both Charles 
and Parliament now began to gather troops and prepare for 
the inevitable conflict. 

The opposing parties seemed to be very evenly matched. 
Around the king rallied nearly all the nobles, the Anglican 
" c l* " c ^ er §y' the Roman Catholics, a majority of the 
and " Round- "squires," or country gentry, and the members 
heads " Q f ^ un i V ersities. The royalists received the 

name of "Cavaliers." The parliamentarians, or "Round- 
heads," 1 were mostly recruited from the trading classes in the 

1 So called, because some of them wore closely cropped hair, in contrast to the 
flowing locks of the "Cavaliers." 







| 




tl 




ji 


'*& JKVV> V 



OLIVER CROMWELL 
After the painting L,y Sir Peter Lely in 1653, Pitti Gallery, Florence 



Stuart Absolutism in England 287 

towns and the small landowners in the country. The working 
people remained as a rule indifferent and took little part in the 
struggle. 

Both Pym and Hampden died in the second year of the war, 
and henceforth the leadership of the parliamentarians fell to 
Oliver Cromwell. He was a country gentleman Oliver 
from the east of England, and Hampden's cousin. Cromwell 
Cromwell represented the university of Cambridge in the 
Long Parliament and displayed there great audacity in oppos- 
ing the government. An unfriendly critic at this time de- 
scribes "his countenance swollen and reddish, his voice sharp 
and untuneable, and his eloquence full of fervor." Though 
a zealous Puritan, who believed himself to be the chosen agent 
of the Lord, Cromwell was not an ascetic. He hunted, 

bis*** 4&n. 




Specimen of Cromwell's Handwriting 

hawked, played bowls and other games, had an ear for music, 
and valued art and learning. In public life he showed him- 
self a statesman of much insight and a military genius. 

Fortune favored the royalists, until Cromwell assumed com- 
mand of the parliamentary forces. To him was due the for- 
mation of a cavalry regiment of "honest, sober _. „_ 

. J ° The Iron- 

Chnstians, whose watchwords were texts from sides " and 
Scripture and who charged in battle singing psalms. !^ e " ^? w 
These "Ironsides," as Cromwell said, "had the 
fear of God before them and made some conscience of what 
they did." They were so successful that Parliament permitted 
Cromwell to reorganize a large part of the army into the 
" New Model," a body of professional, highly disciplined soldiers. 
The "New Model" defeated Charles decisively at the battle of 
Naseby, near the center of England (1645). Charles then 
surrendered to the Scotch, who soon turned him over to 
Parliament. 



288 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

The surrender of the king ended the Great Rebellion, but 
left the political situation in doubt. The Puritans by this time 
Presby- nac ^ divided into two rival sects. The Presby- 

terians and terians wished to make the Church of England, 

epen en s j^ e j.]^ f Scotland, Presbyterian l in faith and 
worship. Through their control of Parliament, they were able 
to pass acts doing away with bishops, forbidding the use of the 
Book of Common Prayer, and requiring every one to accept 
Presbyterian doctrines. The other Puritan sect, known as 
Independents, 2 felt that religious beliefs should not be a matter 
of compulsion. They rejected both Anglicanism and Presby- 
terianism and desired to set up churches of their own, where 
they might worship as seemed to them right. The Inde- 
pendents had the powerful backing of Cromwell and the "New 
Model," so that the stage was set for a quarrel between Parlia- 
ment and the army. 

King Charles, though a prisoner in the power of his enemies, 
hoped to profit by their divisions. The Presbyterian majority 
" Pride's m tne House of Commons was willing to restore 
Purge," the king, provided he would give his assent to 

the establishment of Presbyterianism in England. 
But the army wanted no reconciliation with the captive monarch 
and at length took matters into its own hand. A party of 
soldiers, under the command of a Colonel Pride, excluded the 
Presbyterian members from the floor of the House, leaving the 
Independents alone to conduct the government. This action 
is known as "Pride's Purge." Cromwell approved of it, and 
from this time he became the real ruler of England. 

The "Rump," as the remnant of the House of Commons 
was contemptuously called, immediately brought the king 
Execution of before a High Court of Justice composed of his 
Charles I, bitterest enemies. He refused to acknowledge 
the right of the court to try him and made no 
defense whatever'. Charles was speedily convicted and sen- 
tenced to be beheaded, "as a tyrant, traitor, murderer, and 

1 See page 265, note 1. 

2 Also called Separatists, and later known as Congregationalists. 



Stuart Absolutism in England 289 

public enemy to the good of the people." He met death with 
quiet dignity and courage on a scaffold erected in front of White- 
hall Palace in London. The king's execution went far beyond 
the wishes of most Englishmen; "cruel necessity" formed 
its only justification ; but it established once for all in England 
the principle that rulers are responsible to their subjects. 




Great Seal of England under the Commonwealth (reduced) 

The reverse represents the House of Commons in session. 

The "Rump" also abolished the House of Lords and the 

office of king. It named a Council of State, most of whose 

members were chosen from the House of Commons, The c m- 

to carry on the government. England now be- monwealth 

came a national republic, or Commonwealth, the first in the 

history of the world. 1 The new republic was clearly the creation 

1 The Swiss Confederation (1291) and the United Netherlands (1581) were fed- 
erative republics. 



290 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

of a minority. Anglicans, Presbyterians, and Roman Catholics 
were ready to restore the monarchy, but as long as the power 
lay with the army, the small sect of Independents could im- 
pose its will on the great majority of the English people. 

Meanwhile, the "Rump" had become more and more un- 
popular. Cromwell at length dissolved it by force. Another 
The Parliament, made up of "God-fearing men," 

Protectorate proved equally incapable and after a few months 
resigned its authority into Cromwell's hands. His reluctance 
to play the autocrat led him to accept a so-called Instrument 
of Government drawn up by some of his officers, and notable 
as the only written constitution which England has ever had. 
It is also of extreme interest as the first example of a con- 
stitution which attempts to draw a sharp dividing line between 
the powers of the legislative and executive departments. The 
Instrument of Government vested supreme power in a single 
person styled the Lord Protector, holding office for life. He was 
to be assisted, and to some extent controlled, by a council and 
a parliament. The Protectorate, which thus supplanted the 
Commonwealth, really formed a limited or constitutional mon- 
archy in all but name. 

The Lord Protector governed England for five years. 
His successful conduct of foreign affairs gave to that country 
an importance in European politics which it 
Lord Pro- had not enjoyed since the time of Elizabeth, 
tector, 1653- jje died in 1658, leaving the army without a master 
and the country without a settled government. 
Two years later the nation, now grown weary of military 
rule, recalled the eldest son of Charles I to the throne. 

It seemed, indeed, as if the Puritan Revolution had been a 
complete failure. But this was hardly true. The revolution 
The Puritan arrested the growth of absolutism and divine right 
Revolution i n England. It created among Englishmen a lasting 
hostility to despotic rule, whether exercised by King, Parliament, 
Protector, or army. Furthermore, it sent forth into the world 
ideas of popular sovereignty, which, during the eighteenth cen- 
tury, helped to produce the American and French revolutions. 



The Restoration and the " Glorious Revolution " 291 

73. The Restoration and the " Glorious Revolution," 
1660-1714 

Charles II pledged himself to maintain Magna Carta, the 
Petition of Right, and various statutes limiting the royal power. 
The people of England wished to have a king, but Charles II 
they also wished their king to govern by the advice kin e- 1660- 
of Parliament. Charles, less obstinate and more 
astute than his father, recognized this fact, and, when a conflict 
threatened with his ministers or Parliament, always avoided 
it by timely concessions. Whatever happened, he used to say, 
he was resolved "never set out on his travels again." Charles's 
charm of manner, wit, and genial humor made him a popular 
monarch, in spite of his grave faults of character. He was a 
king who "never said a foolish thing and never did a wise 
one." 

The Restoration brought back the Church of England, 
together with the Stuarts. Parliament, more intolerant than 
the king, made the use of the Book of Common The Dis- 
proves compulsory and required ministers to ex- senters 
press their consent to everything contained in it. Rather 
than do so, nearly two thousand clergymen resigned their 
positions. Among them were found Presbyterians, Inde- 
pendents (or Congregationalists), Baptists, and Quakers. The 
members of these sects, since they refused to accept the national 
Church, were henceforth classed as Dissenters. 1 They might 
not hold meetings for worship, or teach in schools, or hold any 
public office. Thus Dissenters, as well as Roman Catholics, 
had to endure persecution. 

One of the most important events belonging to the reign of 
Charles II was the passage by Parliament of the Habeas Corpus 
Act. The writ of habeas corpus 2 is an order, issued by a 
judge, requiring a person held in custody to be brought 
before the court. If upon examination good reason is shown 

1 Or Nonconformists. This name is still applied to English Protestants not 
members of the Anglican Church. 

s A Latin phrase meaning "You may have the body." 



292 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

for keeping the prisoner, he is to be remanded for trial ; other- 
wise he must either be freed or released on bail. This writ 
Habeas na d been long used in England, and one of the 

Corpus Act, clauses of Magna Carta expressly provided against 
arbitrary imprisonment. It had always been pos- 
sible, however, for the king or his ministers to order the arrest of 
a person considered dangerous to the state, without making any 
formal charge against him. The Habeas Corpus Act estab- 
lished the principle that every man, not charged with or con- 
victed of a known crime, is entitled to his liberty. Most of 
the British possessions where the Common Law prevails have 
accepted the act, and it has been adopted by the United 
States. 

The reign of Charles II also saw the beginning of the modern 
party system in Parliament. Two opposing parties took shape, 
Whigs and very largely out of a religious controversy. The 
Tones king, from his ldng life in France, was partial to 

Roman Catholicism, though he did not formally embrace that 
faith until the moment of death. His brother James, the 
heir to the throne, became an avowed Roman Catholic, much 
to the disgust of many members of Parliament. A bill was now 
brought forward to exclude Prince James from the succession, 
because of his conversion. Its supporters received the nick- 
name of Whigs, while those who opposed it were called Tories. 
The former were successors of the old "Roundheads," the 
latter, of the "Cavaliers." x The bill did not pass the House 
of Lords, but the two parties in Parliament continued to divide 
on other questions. They survive to-day as the Liberals and 
the Conservatives, and still dispute the government of England 
between them. 

James II lacked the attractive personality which had made 

his brother a popular ruler; moreover, he was a staunch be- 

T TT liever in the divine right of kings. He soon 
James II, ° b 

king, 1685- quarreled with Parliament and further antagonized 
1688 his Protestant subjects by "suspending" the laws 

against Roman Catholics and by appointing them to positions 

1 See page 286 and note 1. 



The Restoration and the " Glorious Revolution " 293 

of authority and influence. Englishmen might have tolerated 
James to the end of his reign (he was then nearing sixty), in 
the hope that he would be succeeded by his Protestant daughter 
Mary. But the birth in 1688 of a son to his Roman Catholic 
second wife changed the whole situation by opening up the 
prospect of a Roman Catholic succession to the throne. At 
last a number of Whig and Tory leaders invited William, prince 
of Orange, stadholder or governor-general of Holland, to rescue 
England from Stuart despotism. 1 

William landed in England with a small army and marched 
unopposed to London. James II, deserted by his retainers and 
soldiers, soon found himself alone. He fled to Accession 
France, where he lived the remainder of his days of William 
as a pensioner at the French court. Parliament an ary 
granted the throne conjointly to William and Mary, William 
to rule during his lifetime and Mary to have the succession 
if she survived him.' 2 Should they have no children, the throne 
was to go to Mary's sister Anne. 

At the same time Parliament took care to perpetuate its own 
authority and the Protestant religion by enacting the Bill of 
Rights, which has a place by the side of Magna The Bill of 
Carta and the Petition of Right among the great Rights, 1689 
documents of English constitutional history. This act decreed 
that the sovereign must henceforth be a member of the Anglican 
Church. It forbade him to "suspend" the operation of the 
laws, or to levy money or maintain a standing army except by 
consent of Parliament. It also declared that election of mem- 
bers of Parliament should be free, that they should enjoy free- 
dom of speech and action within the two Houses; and that 
excessive bail should not be required, or excessive fines imposed, 
or cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. Finally, it affirmed 
the right of subjects to petition the sovereign and ordered the 
holding of frequent Parliaments. These were not new prin- 
ciples of political liberty, but now the English people were 

1 William was Mary's husband. See the genealogical table, page 295 
note r. 
. * Mary, however, died in i6<)4. 



294 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

strong enough to give them the binding form of laws. They 
reappear in the first ten amendments to the Constitution of 
the United States. 

Parliament also passed a Toleration Act, conceding to Dis- 
senters the right of public worship, though not the right of 
The Tolera- holding any civil or military office. The Dis- 
tion Act, 1689 senters might now worship as they pleased, with- 
out fear of persecution. Unitarians and Roman Catholics, as 
well as Jews, were expressly excluded from the benefits of the 
act. The passage of this measure did much to remove religion 
from English politics as a vital issue. 

The Revolution of 1688- 1689 struck a final blow at ab- 
solutism and divine right in England. An English king be- 
The " Gl '- came henceforth the servant of Parliament, hold- 
ous Revolu- ing office only on good behavior. An act of Parlia- 
ment had made him and an act of Parliament 
might depose him. It is well to remember, however, that the 
Revolution did not form a popular movement. It was a suc- 
cessful struggle for parliamentary supremacy on the part of the 
upper classes. The government of England still remained 
far removed from democracy. 

The supremacy won by Parliament was safeguarded, a few 
years later, by the passage of the Act of Settlement. It pro- 
Act of vided that in case William III or his sister-in-law 

Settlement, Anne died without heirs, the crown should pass 
to Sophia, electress of Hanover, and her descend- 
ants. She was the granddaughter of James I and a Protestant. 
This arrangement deliberately excluded a number of nearer 
representatives of the Stuart house from the succession, because 
they were Roman Catholics. Parliament thus asserted in the 
strongest way the right of the English people to choose their 
own rulers. 

Queen Anne died in 17 14, and in accordance with the Act 

The of Settlement, George I, the son of Sophia of 

Hanoverian Hanover, ascended the throne. He was the first 

member of the Hanoverian dynasty, which has 

since continued to reign in Great Britain. In 191 7, however, 



Absolutism of Louis XIV in France 295 

the official name of the English ruling family was changed 
to "House of Windsor." 1 



74. Absolutism of Louis XIV in France, 1643-1715 

France in the seventeenth century furnished the best ex- 
ample of an absolute monarchy, during the reign of Louis XIV. 
He was a man of handsome presence, slightly be- Louis xiv, 
low the middle height, with a prominent nose and the man 
abundant hair, which he allowed to fall over his shoulders. In 
manner he was dignified, reserved, courteous, and as majestic, 
it is said, in his dressing-gown as in his robes of state. A con- 
temporary wrote that he would have been every inch a king, 
"even if he had been born under the roof of a beggar." Louis 
possessed much natural intelligence, a retentive memory, and 
great capacity for work. It must be added, however, that his 

1 Stuart and Hanoverian Dynasties. 
James I (1603-1625) 



Charles I 
(1625-1649) 



I 
Charles II 
(1660-1685) 
Mary, m. William, 
Prince of Orange 



Elizabeth, m. Frederick V, Elector of the 

Palatinate 

Sophia, m. Ernest Augustus, Elector 

of Hanover 
George I 

(1714-1727) 



James II 
(168S-1688) 



William III, m. Mary Anne 

Prince of (1689-1694) (1702-1714) 
Orange, 
King of 
England (1689-1702) 



George II 
(1727-1760) 

Frederick, Prince of Wales 
(d. 175O 

George 1 1 1 
(1760-1820) 



George IV William IV 
(1820-1830) (I830-X837) 



Edward, Duke of Kent 

I 
Victoria 
(1837-1901) 

Edward VII 
(1001-1910) 

George V 
(1910- ) 



296 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

general education had been neglected, and that throughout his 
life he remained ignorant and superstitious. Vanity formed a 
striking trait in the character of Louis. He accepted the most 
fulsome compliments and delighted to be known as the "Grand 
Monarch" and the "Sun-king." 




Hotel des Invalides, Paris 

Built by Louis XIV as a home for infirm or disabled soldiers. Napoleon Bonaparte 
is entombed here. 

The famous saying, "I am the State," x though not uttered 
by Louis, accurately expressed his conviction that in him were 
Louis XIV, embodied the power and greatness of France. 
the king p ew monarc hs have tried harder to justify their 

despotic rule. He was fond of gayety and sport, but he never 
permitted himself to be turned away from the punctual dis- 
1 L'Etat, c'est moi. 



Absolutism of Louis XIV in France 297 

charge of his royal duties. Until the close of his reign — one 
of the longest in the annals of Europe — Louis devoted from 
five to nine hours a day to what he catted the " trade of a king." 

Louis gathered around him a magnificent court at Versailles, 
near Paris. Here a whole royal city, with palaces, parks, 
groves, terraces, and fountains, sprang into being The French 
at his order. The gilded salons and mirrored court 
corridors of Versailles were soon crowded with members of the 
nobility. They now spent little time on their estates, pre- 
ferring to remain at Versailles in attendance on the king, to 
whose favor they owed offices, pensions, and honors. The 
splendor of the French court cast its spell upon Europe. Every 
king and prince looked to Louis as the model of what a ruler 
should be and tried to imitate him. During this period the 
French language, manners, dress, art, and literature became 
the accepted standards of polite society in all civilized lands. 

How unwise it may be to concentrate authority in the hands 
of one man is shown by the melancholy record of the wars of 
Louis XIV. To make France powerful and gain French 
fame for himself, Louis plunged his country into a militarism 
series of struggles from which it emerged completely exhausted. 
He dreamed of dominating all western Europe, but his aggres- 
sions provoked against him a constantly increasing number of 
allies, who in the end proved to be too strong even for the king's 
able generals and fine armies. 

Of the four great wars which filled a large part of Louis's 
reign, all but the last were designed to extend the dominions of 
France on the east and northeast as far as the The Rhine 
Rhine. That river in ancient times had separated boundary 
Gaul and Germany, and Louis regarded it as a "natural bound- 
ary" of France. Some expansion in this direction had already 
been made by the Peace of Westphalia, when France gained 
much of Alsace and secured the recognition of her old claims 
to the bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun in Lorraine. A 
treaty negotiated with Spain in 1659 also gave to France posses- 
sions in Artois and Flanders. Louis thus had a good basis 
for operations in the Rhinelands. 



298 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 



The French king began his aggressions by an effort to annex 
the Belgian or Spanish Netherlands, which then belonged to 
Three wars Spain. A triple alliance of Holland, England, 
for the and Sweden forced him to relinquish all his con- 

quests, except some territory in Flanders (1668). 
Louis blamed the Dutch for his setback and determined to 




Acquisitions of Louis XIV 
Acquisitions of Louis XV 



Acquisitions or Louis XIV and Louis XV 

punish them. Moreover, the Dutch represented everything to 
which he was opposed, for Holland was a republic, the keen rival 
of France in trade, and Protestant in religion. By skillful 
diplomacy he persuaded England and Sweden to stand aloof, 
while his armies entered Holland and drew near to Amsterdam. 



Absolutism of Louis XIV in France 299 

At this critical moment William, prince of Orange, 1 became 
the Dutch leader. He was a descendant of that William the 
Silent, who, a century before, had saved the Dutch out of the 
hands of Spain. By William's orders the Dutch cut the dikes 
and interposed a watery barrier to further advance by the 
French. William then formed another Continental coalition, 
which carried on the war till Louis signified his desire for peace. 
The Dutch did not lose a foot of territory, but Spain was obliged 
to cede to France the important province of Franche-Comte 
(1678). A few years later Louis sought additional territory 
in the Rhinelands, but again an alliance of Spain, Holland, 
Austria, and England compelled him to sue for terms (1697). 

The treaty of peace concluding the third war for the Rhine 
confirmed the French king in the possession of Strasbourg, to- 
gether with other cities and districts of Alsace Alsace and 
which he had previously annexed. Alsace was Lorraine 
now completely joined to France, except for some territories 
of small extent which were acquired about a century later. 
The Alsatians, though mainly of Teutonic extraction, in process 
of time considered themselves French and lost all desire for 
union with any of the German states. The greater part of 
Lorraine was not added to France until 1766, during the reign 
of Louis's successor. The Lorrainers, likewise, became thor- 
oughly French in feeling. 

The European balance of power had thus far been pre- 
served, but it was now threatened in another direction. The 
king of Spain lay dying, and as he was without The Spanish 
children or brothers to succeed him, all Europe succession 
wondered what would be the fate of his vast possessions in 
Europe and America. Louis had married one of his sisters, 
and the Holy Roman Emperor another, so both the Bourbons 
and the Austrian Hapsburgs could put forth claims to the Span- 
ish throne. When the king died, it was found that he had left 
his entire dominions to one of Louis's grandsons, in the hope 
that the French might be strong enough to keep them undivided. 
Though Louis knew that acceptance of the inheritance would 

1 Subsequently \\ illiam 111 of England. See page 203. 



3oo The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 



involve a war with Austria and probably with England, whose 
ruler, William III, was Louis's old foe, ambition triumphed 
over fear and the desire for glory over consideration for the 
welfare of France. Louis proudly presented his grandson to 
the court at Versailles, saying, "Gentlemen, behold the king 
of Spain." 

In the War of the Spanish Succession France and Spain 
faced the Grand Alliance, which included England, Holland, 

Austria, several of the 




War of the 

Spanish German states, and 

Succession, Portugal. Europe 
had never known a 



1701-1713 



war that concerned sO many coun- 
tries and peoples. William III 
died shortly after the outbreak of 
hostilities, leaving the continuance 
of the contest as a legacy to his 
sister-in-law, Queen Anne. Eng- 
land supplied the coalition with 
funds, a fleet, and also with the 
ablest commander of the age, the 
duke of Marlborough. In Eugene, 
prince of Savoy, the Allies had 
another skillful and daring general. 
Their great victory at Blenheim 
in 1704 was the first of a series of 
successes which finally drove the 
French out of Germany and Italy 
and opened the road to Paris. 
But dissensions among the Allies and the heroic resistance of 
France and Spain enabled Louis to hold his enemies at bay, 
until the exhaustion of both sides led to the conclusion of the 
Peace of Utrecht. 

This peace ranks among the most important diplomatic 
arrangements of modern times. First, Louis's grandson was 
recognized as king of Spain and her colonies, on condition that 
the Spanish and French crowns should never be united. Since 



Marlborough 

A miniature in the possession of the 
duke of Buccleugh. 



fla- 

3 g- M « w 





up- , 



302 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

this time Bourbon sovereigns have continued to rule in Spain. 
Next, the Austrian Hapsburgs gained the Spanish dominions 
Peace of ^ n ^ ta ^> that i s > Milan and Naples, the island of 

Utrecht, Sardinia, and the Belgian or Spanish Nether- 

1713 lands (thenceforth for a century called the Aus- 

trian Netherlands). Finally, . England obtained from Fiance 
extensive possessions in North America, and from Spain, Mi- 
norca and the rock of Gibraltar, commanding the narrow en- 
trance to the Mediterranean. 

Two of the smaller members of the Grand Alliance likewise 
profited by the Peace of Utrecht. The right of the elector of 
B , Brandenburg to hold the title of king of Prussia 

burg-Prussia was acknowledged. This formed an important 
and Savoy step - m ^ f ortunes f t h e Hohenzollern dynasty. 

The duchy of Savoy also became a kingdom and received the 
island of Sicily (shortly afterwards exchanged for Sardinia). 
The house of Savoy in the nineteenth century provided Italy 
with its present reigning family. 

France lost far less by the war than at one time seemed 
probable. Louis gave up his dream of dominating Europe, 
Position of but he kept all the Continental acquisitions made 
France earlier in his reign. Yet the price of the king's 

warlike policy had been a heavy one. France paid it in the 
shape of famine and pestilence, excessive taxes, huge debts, 
and the impoverishment of the people. Louis, now a very old 
man, survived the Peace of Utrecht only two years. As he 
lay dying, he turned to his little heir * and said, "Try to keep 
peace with your neighbors. I have been too fond of war; 
do not imitate me in that, nor in my too great expenditure." 

75. Russia under Peter the Great, 1689-1725 

The Russians at the opening of modern times seemed to be 
rather an Asiatic than a European people. Three hundred 
years of Mongol rule had isolated them from their Slavic 
neighbors and had interrupted the stream of civilizing in- 

1 His great-grandson, then a child of five years. The reign of Louis XV covered 
the period 1715-1774. 




LOUIS XIV 

After the painting by Hyacinthe Rigaud, Louvre, Paris 




PETER THE GREAT 

After the painting by Karel de Moor 



Russia under Peter the Great 



303 




The Russians 



fluences which in earlier days flowed into Russia from Scandi- 
navia and from the Byzantine Empire. 1 The absence of seaports 
discouraged foreign commerce, through which Euro- 
pean ideas and customs might have entered Russia, 
while at the same time the nature of the country made agri- 
culture rather than industry the principal occupation. Most 
of the Russians were ignorant, superstitious peasants, who 
led secluded lives in small farming villages scattered over the 
plains and throughout the forests. Even the inhabitants of 
the towns lacked the education and enlightened manners of the 
1 For Russian history during the Middle Ages see pages 167 arid 193. 



3<H The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

western peoples, whose ways they disliked and whose religion, 
whether Protestantism or Catholicism, they condemned as 
heretical. Russia, in short, needed to be restored to Europe, 
and Europe needed to be introduced to Russia. 

Russia under Ivan the Great (1462-1505), the tsar who 
expelled the Mongols, was still an inland state. The natural 
Russian increase of her people, their migratory habits, 

expansion and the desire for civilizing intercourse with other 
in urope nations, impelled her expansion seawards. By 
the annexation of Novgorod and its possessions, Ivan carried 
Russian territory to the Arctic. Wars of his successors with 
the Tatars gave Russia command of the Volga from source to 
mouth and brought her to the Caspian. Russian emigrants 
also occupied the border country called the Ukraine, 1 which 
lay on both sides of the lower Dnieper. Russia continued, 
however, to be shut out from the Baltic by the Swedes and 
Poles and from the Black Sea by the Turks. 

The family of tsars, descended from the Northman Ruric 

in the ninth century, became extinct seven hundred years later, 

Accession an d disputes over the succession led to civil wars 

of the an( j foreign invasions. The Russians then pro- 

Romanov ill i r 1 ■ 

dynasty, ceeded to select a new tsar, and for this purpose 

1613 a general assembly of nobles and delegates from 

the towns met at Moscow. Their choice fell upon one of their 
own number, Michael Romanov by name, whose family was 
related to the old royal line. He proved to be an excellent 
ruler in troublous times. His grandson was the celebrated 
Peter the Great. 

Peter became sole tsar of Russia when only seventeen years 
of age. His character almost defies analysis. An English 
_ contemporary, who knew him well, described him 

as "a man of a very hot temper, soon inflamed, 
and very brutal in his passion." Deeds of fiendish cruelty were 
congenial to him. After a mutiny of his bodyguard he edified 
the court by himself slicing off the heads of the culprits. In 
order to quell opposition in his family, he had his wife whipped 
1 Russian krai, "frontier." See the map on page 303. 



Russia under Peter the Great 305 

by the knout and ordered his own son to be tortured and ex- 
ecuted. He was coarse, gluttonous, and utterly without 
personal dignity. The companions of his youth were profli- 
gates ; his banquets were orgies of dissipation. Yet Peter 
could be often frank and good-humored, and to his friends he 
was as loyal as he was treacherous to his foes. Whatever his 
weaknesses, few men have done more than Peter to change 
the course of history, and few have better deserved the appel- 
lation of "the Great." 

Soon after becoming tsar Peter sent fifty young Russians of 
the best families to England, Holland, and Venice, to absorb 
all they could of European ideas. Afterwards he Peter in 
came himself, traveling incognito as "Peter western 
Mikhailov." He spent two years abroad, partic- ur °P e 
ularly in Holland and England, where he studied ship-building 
and navigation. He also collected miners, mechanics, engineers, 
architects, and experts of every sort for the roads and bridges, 
the ships and palaces, the schools and hospitals which were to 
arise in Russia. 

Many of Peter's reforms were intended to introduce the 
customs of western Europe into Russia. The long Asiatic robes 
of Russian nobles had to give way to short Ger- European . 
man jackets and hose. Long beards, which the ization of 
people considered sacred, had to be shaved, or ussia 
else a tax paid for the privilege of wearing one. Women, 
previously kept in seclusion, were permitted to appear in public 
without veils and to mingle at dances and entertainments 
with men. A Russian order of chivalry was founded. The 
Bible was translated into the vernacular and sold at popular 
prices. Peter adopted the "Julian calendar," in place of the 
old Russian calendar, which began the year on the first of 
September, supposed to be the date of the creation. He also 
improved the Russian alphabet by omitting some of its cum- 
bersome letters and by simplifying others. 

Peter found in Russia no regular army ; he organized one 
after the German fashion. The soldiers (except the mounted 
warriors known as Cossacks) were uniformed and armed like 



306 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

European troops. He found no fleet; he built one, modeled 
upon that of Holland. He opened mines, cut canals, laid out 
R roads, introduced sheep breeding, and fostered by 

struction of protective tariffs the growth of silk and woolen 
Russia manufactures. He instituted a police system and a 

postal service. He established schools of medicine, engineering, 
and navigation, as well as those of lower grade. He also framed 
a code of laws based upon the legal systems of western 
Europe. 

Very different views have been expressed as to the value of 
Peter's work. It is said, on the one side, that Russia could 
Value of 0IU< y ^ e made over by such measures as he used ; 

Peter's that the Russian people had to be dragged from 

their old paths and pushed on the broad road of 
progress. On the other side, it is argued that Peter's reforms 
were too sudden, too radical, and too little suited to the Slavic 
national character. The upper classes acquired only a veneer of 
western civilization, and with it many vices. The nobles con- 
tinued to be indolent, corrupt, and indifferent to the public 
welfare. The clergy became merely the tools of the tsar. The 
common people remained as ignorant and oppressed as ever 
and without any opportunity of self-government. Whatever 
may be the truth as to these two views, no one disputes the fact 
that in a single reign, by the action of one man, Russia began to 
pass from semi-barbarism to civilization. 

The remaking of Russia according to European models 
formed only a half of Peter's program. His foreign policy was 
St. Peters- equally ambitious. He realized that Russia needed 
bur s readier access to the sea than could be found 

through the Arctic port of Archangel. Peter made little head- 
way against the Turks, who controlled the Black Sea, but 
twenty years of intermittent warfare with the Swedes enabled 
him to acquire the Swedish provinces on the eastern shore of 
the Baltic. Here in the swamps of the river Neva, not far 
from the Gulf of Finland, Peter built a new and splendid capital, 
giving it the German name of (St.) Petersburg. 1 He had at 

1 In 1914 the name was changed to the Slavic equivalent, Petrograd. 



Russia under Catherine II 



307 



last realized his long-cherished dream of opening a "window" 
through which the Russian people might look into Europe. 

76. Russia under Catherine II, 1762-1796 

Shortly after the death of Peter the Great, at the early age of 
fifty-three, the male line of the Romanov dynasty became 
extinct. The succession now passed to women, Tsarina 
who intermarried with German princes and thus Catherine 
increased the German influence in Russia. It was a German 
princess, Catherine II, 
who completed Peter's 
work of remaking Russia 
into a European state. 
She, also, has been called 
"the Great," a title possi- 
bly merited by her achieve- 
ments, though not by her 
character. Catherine 
came to Russia as the 
wife of the heir-apparent. 
Once in her adopted coun- 
try, she proceeded to make 
herself in all ways a Rus- 
sian, learning the language 
and even conforming, at 
least outwardly, to the 
Orthodox (or Russian) 
Church. Her husband was a weakling, and Catherine managed 
to get rid of him after he had reigned only six months. She 
then mounted the throne and for thirty-four years ruled Russia 
with a firm hand. 

The defeat of Sweden left Poland and Turkey as the two 
countries which still blocked the path of Russia toward the 
sea. Catherine warred against them throughout Catherine's 
her reign. She took the lion's share of Poland, foreign 
when that unfortunate kingdom, as we shall 




Catherine II 

After a painting by Van Wilk. 



policy 



shortly learn, was divided among Russia, Austria, and Prussia. 



308 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

Catherine also secured from the Turks an outlet for Russia on 
the Black Sea, though she never realized her dream of expelling 
them from European soil. 

When Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453, their Eu- 
ropean dominions already included a considerable part of the 
Balkan Peninsula. The two centuries following 
of t h e witnessed the steady progress of the Ottoman 

Ottoman arms, until, of all the Balkan states, only tiny 

power to 1683 __ . . . , . _. 

Montenegro preserved its independence. Pressing 

northward, the Turks conquered part of Hungary and made 

the rest of that country a dependency. They overran the 

Crimea and bestowed it upon a Mongol khan as a tributary 

province. They annexed Egypt, Syria, Armenia, Mesopotamia, 

and the coast of northern Africa. The Black Sea and the 

eastern Mediterranean became Turkish lakes. 

Two dramatic events showed that the Christian soldiery 
of Europe could still oppose a successful resistance to the 
"Ti Cro Moslem warriors. The first was the crippling 

and the of Turkish sea-power by the combined fleets of 

Crescent Venice, Genoa, and Spain at a naval battle in the 

Gulf of Lepanto, off the western coast of Greece (1571). 
The second was the defeat suffered by the Turks under the 
walls of Vienna (1683). They marched on the Austrian capital, 
two hundred thousand strong, laid siege to it, and would have 
taken it but for the timely appearance of a relieving army 
commanded by the Polish king, John Sobieski. Poland at 
that time saved Austria from destruction and definitely stopped 
the land advance of the Turks in Europe. 

After 1683 the boundaries of European Turkey gradually 

receded. The Hapsburgs won back most of Hungary by the 

close of the seventeenth century and during the 

the ottoman eighteenth century further enlarged their pos- 

power after sessions at the expense of the sultan. Catherine 

1683 

II, as the result of two wars with the Turks, se- 
cured the Crimea and the northern coast of the Black Sea. 
Russian merchant ships also received the right of free naviga- 
tion in the Black Sea and of access through the Bosporus and 



Austria and Maria Theresa 309 

Dardanelles to the Mediterranean. In this way Catherine 
opened for Russia another "window" on Europe. 

Turkey lost more than territory. Russian consuls were 
admitted to Turkish towns, and Russian residents in Turkey 
were granted the free exercise of their religion. The 
As time went on, the tsars even claimed the right Eastern 
of protecting Christian subjects of the sultan 
and consequently of interfering at will in Turkish affairs. The 
sultan thus tended to become the "sick man" of Europe, the 
disposition of whose possessions would henceforth form one 
of the thorny problems of European diplomacy. In a word, 
what is called the Eastern Question began. 

77. Austria and Maria Theresa, 1740-1780 

The Hapsburgs were originally feudal lords of a small dis- 
trict in what is now northern Switzerland, where the ruins of 
their ancestral castle l may still be seen. Count The 
Rudolf, the real maker of the family fortunes, Hapsburg 
secured the archduchy of Austria, with its capital ynas y 
of Vienna, and in 1273 was chosen Holy Roman Emperor. 
The imperial title afterwards became hereditary in the Haps- 
burg dynasty. 

The name "Austria" is loosely applied to all the territories 
which the Hapsburgs acquired in the course of centuries, by 
conquest, marriage, or inheritance. 2 By the eight- The Haps- 
eenth century they had come to rule over the bur s realm 
most extraordinary jumble of peoples to be found in Europe. 
There were Germans in Austria proper and Silesia, Czechs in 
Bohemia and Moravia, Magyars, Slovaks, Rumanians, Croa- 
tians, and Slovenians in Hungary and its dependencies, Italians 
in Milan and Tuscany, and Flemings and Walloons in the 
Netherlands. It was impossible to group such widely scattered 
peoples into one centralized state ; it was equally impossible 
to form them into a federation. Their sole bond of union was a 
common allegiance to the Hapsburg monarch. 

1 German Habkhtsburg ("Hawks' Burgh"). 

2 See the map facing page 520. 



310 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 



Pragmatic 
Sanction 



The Hapsburg realm threatened to break up in the eighteenth 
century upon the death of the emperor Charles VI, who lacked 
The male heirs. Charles, however, had made a so- 

called Pragmatic Sanction, or solemn compact, 
declaring his dominions to be indivisible and 
leaving them to his eldest daughter, Maria Theresa. Most 

of the European powers 
pledged themselves by treaty 
to observe this arrangement. 
The emperor died in 1740 
and Maria Theresa became 
Maria archduchess of 

Theresa Austria, queen 

of Hungary, queen of Bohemia 
and sovereign of all the other 
Hapsburg lands. She was 
then only twenty-three years 
old, strikingly handsome, and 
gifted with much charm of 
manner. Her youth, her 
beauty, and her sex might 
have entitled her to con- 
by those states 
which had agreed to respect the Pragmatic Sanction. But 
a paper bulwark could not safeguard Austria against Prussia 
and Prussia's allies. 




Maria Theresa 



the 



After a pastel painting formerly in 
possession of the Archduke Frederick, Vienna, sideration 



78. Prussia and Frederick the Great, 1740-1786 

Prussia, the creator of modern Germany, was the creation 
of the Hohenzollerns. 1 Excepting Frederick the Great, no 
The Hohen- Hohenzollern deserves to be ranked as a genius ; 
zollems ^ut -j. W0VL \^ ^ e }jard to name another dynasty 

with so many able, ambitious, and unscrupulous rulers. The 
Hohenzollerns prided themselves on the fact that almost every 
member of the family enlarged the possessions received from 

1 The name is derived from that of their castle on the heights of Zollern in south- 
ern Germany. Emperor William II was the twenty-fourth ruler of the line. 




FREDERICK THE GREAT 

After the painting by Antoine Pesne, Berlin Museum 



Prussia and Frederick the Great 311 

his ancestors. They did this by purchase, by inheritance, by 
shrewd diplomacy, and, most of all, by hard fighting. 

The veil of obscurity hanging over the early history of the 
Hohenzollerns lifts early in the fifteenth century, when one of 
them received the mark of Brandenburg from the Margraviate 
Holy Roman Emperor, as compensation for various of Branden- 
sums of money advanced to him. Brandenburg 
in the Middle Ages had formed a German colony planted 
among the Slavs beyond the Elbe. With the margraviate 
went the electoral dignity, that is to say, the ruler of Branden- 
burg was one of the seven German princes who enjoyed the 
privilege of choosing the emperor. 

The Hohenzollerns as yet had no connection with Prussia. 
That country received its name from the Borussi, a heathen 
people most closely related to the Lithuanians. Duchy of 
The Borussi occupied the Baltic coast east of the Prussla - 1618 
Vistula. They were conquered and well-nigh exterminated in 
the thirteenth century by the Teutonic Knights, a military- 
religious order which arose during the crusades. The Prussian 
landed aristocracy (Junkers) has largely descended from these 
hard-riding, hard-fighting, fierce, cruel knights. The decline 
of their order in the fifteenth century enabled the king of Po- 
land to annex West Prussia. During the Reformation the 
Teutonic grand master, who was a near relative of the Hohen- 
zollerns of Brandenburg, dissolved the order and changed East 
Prussia into a secular duchy. His family became extinct 
early in the seventeenth century, and the duchy then passed 
to the elector of Brandenburg. 

The period between the close of the Thirty Years' War 
and the accession of Frederick the Great saw many additions 
to the Hohenzollern domains. 1 The Hohenzollerns Kingdom of 
at length became powerful enough to aspire to Prussia, 1701 
royal dignity. At the outbreak of the War of the Spanish 
Succession, the emperor, who was anxious to receive the elector's 
support, allowed him to assume the title of "king" and 
to claim, henceforth, that he ruled by divine right. Prussia, 
1 See the map facing page 314. 



312 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

rather than Brandenburg, gave its name to the new kingdom, 
because the former was an independent state, while the latter 
was a member of the Holy Roman Empire. 

Only a strong hand could hold together the scattered pos- 
sessions of the Hohenzollerns. Their hand was strong. No 
Prussian monarchs of the age exercised more unlimited 

absolutism authority or required more complete obedience 
from their subjects. According to the Hohenzollern principle, 
the government could not be too absolute, provided it was 
efficient. The ruler, working through his ministers, who were 
merely his clerks, must foster agriculture, industry, and com- 
merce, promote education, and act as the guide of his people 
in religion and morals. 

The Hohenzollerns devoted themselves consistently to the 
upbuilding of their military forces. They wanted an army 
Prussian powerful enough to defend a kingdom without 

militarism natural boundaries and stretching in detached 
provinces all the way from the Rhine to the Niemen. The 
soldiers at first were volunteers, recruited in different parts of 
Germany, but it became necessary to fill up the gaps in the 
ranks by compulsory levies among the peasants. Carefully 
trained officers, appointed from the nobility and advanced only 
on merit, enforced an iron discipline. The soldiers, it was said, 
feared their commanders more than they did the enemy. 

Frederick the Great became king at the age of twenty-eight. 
He was rather below the average height and inclined to stoutness, 
Frederick good looking, with the fair hair of North Germans 
the Great an( j blue-gray eyes of extraordinary brilliancy. 
By nature he seems to have been thoroughly selfish and un- 
sympathetic, cynical and crafty. He was not a man to inspire 
affection among his intimates, but with the mass of his subjects 
he was undeniably popular. Innumerable stories circulated in 
Prussia about the simplicity, good humor, and devotion to 
duty of old "Father Fritz." 

The year 1740, when both Frederick cfnd Maria Theresa 
mounted the throne, saw the beginning of a long struggle be- 
tween them. The responsibility for it rests on Frederick's 



Prussia and Frederick the Great 313 

shoulders. The Prussian king coveted Silesia, an Austrian 
province lying to the southeast of Brandenburg and mainly 
German in population. Of all the Hapsburg pos- Acquisition 
sessions it was the one most useful to the Hohen- of Sllesia 
zoller-ns. Frederick suddenly led his army into Silesia and 
overran the country without much difficulty. No justification 
existed for this action. As the king afterwards confessed in his 
Memoirs, "Ambition, interest, and desire of. making people 
talk about me carried the day ; and I decided for war." 

Frederick's action precipitated a general European conflict. 
France, Spain, and Bavaria allied themselves with Prussia, 
in order to partition the -Hapsburg possessions, War of the 
while Great Britain and Holland, anxious to pre- succession 
serve the balance of power 3 took the side of Austria. 1740-1748 
Things might have gone hard with Maria Theresa but for 
the courage and energy which she displayed and the support 
of her Hungarian subjects. In 1748 all the warring countries 
agreed to a mutual restoration of conquests (with the exception 
of Silesia) and signed the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. 

Maria Theresa still hoped to recover her lost province. As 
most of the European sovereigns were either afraid or 
jealous of Frederick, she found no great diffi- 
culty in forming a coalition against him. Russia, the Seven 
France, Sweden, and Saxony entered it. Most Xf55 s War ' 

1706 

of Europe thus united in arms to dismember the 
small Prussian state. 

It happened, however, that at the head of this small state 
was a man of military genius, capable of infusing into others 
his own undaunted spirit and supported by sub- Course of 
jects disciplined, patient, and loyal. Further- the war 
more, Great Britain in the Seven Years' War was an ally of 
Prussia. British gold subsidized the Prussian armies, and 
British troops, by fighting the French in Germany, India, and 
America, weakened Prussia's most dangerous enemy. Fred- 
erick conducted a purely defensive warfare, thrusting now 
here and now there against his slower-moving adversaries, 
who never learned to act in concert and exert their full force 



314 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

simultaneously. Even so, the struggle was desperately un- 
equal. The Russians occupied East Prussia, penetrated Bran- 
denburg, and even captured Berlin. Faced by the gradual 
wearing down of his armies, an empty treasury, and an im- 
poverished country, Frederick more than once meditated 
suicide. What saved him was the accession of a new tsar. 
This ruler happened to be a warm admirer of the Prussian king 
and at once withdrew from the war. Maria Theresa, deprived 
of her eastern ally, now had to come to terms and leave Fred- 
erick in secure possession of Silesia. Soon afterwards the 
Peace of Paris between France and Great Britain brought the 
Seven Years' War to an end (1763). 

This most bloody contest, which cost the lives of nearly 
a million men, seemed to settle little or nothing in Europe, 
Issue of except the ownership of Silesia. Yet the Seven 

the war Years' War really marks an epoch in European 

history. The young Prussian kingdom appeared henceforth 
as one of the great powers of the Continent and as the only 
rival in Germany of the old Hapsburg monarchy. From this 
time it was inevitable that Prussia and Austria would struggle 
for predominance, and that the smaller German states would 
group themselves around one or the other. Frederick, of 
course, like all the Hohenzollerns, fought simply for the ag- 
grandizement of Prussia, but the results of his work were dis- 
closed a century later when the German Empire came into being. 

79. The Partitions of Poland, 1772-1795 

Our first glimpse of the Poles reveals them as a Slavic people, 
still wild and heathen, who occupied the region between the 
upper waters of the Oder and the Vistula. They 
began to adopt Roman Christianity toward the 
close of the tenth century. The Poles suffered terribly from 
the Mongol invasions, but, unlike the Russians, never bowed 
to the yoke of the Great Kham The order of Teutonic Knights 
also made persistent attacks on the Poles, thus endeavoring, 
even in medieval times, to bring their country within the Ger- 
man sphere of influence. 



The Partitions of Poland 315 

The early history of the Poles is closely linked with that 

of the Lithuanians, a kindred though distinct people. The 

Lithuanians originally dwelt among the forests T<i . 

° J ° Lithuanians 

and marshes of the Niemen River. They were 

almost the last of the barbarous inhabitants of Europe to be 

civilized and Christianized. 

Common fear, at first of the Germans and then of the Rus- 
sians, brought the Poles and Lithuanians together. By the 
Union of Lublin (1569) Poland proper and the union of 
grand duchy of Lithuania became a single state, Poles and 
with one king, one Diet, and one currency. After 
the union the old Polish capital of Cracow gave way to 
Warsaw, now one of the largest and finest cities of eastern 
Europe. 

Poland, as the new state may be henceforth called, was 
badly made. It formed an immense, monotonous plain, 
reaching from the Baltic almost to the Black Frontiers of 
Sea. No natural barriers of rivers or moun- Poland 
tains clearly separated the country from Russia on the east, 
the lands of the Hohenzollerns and Hapsburgs on the west, 
and the Ottoman Empire on the south. Even the Baltic Sea 
did not provide a continuous boundary on the north, for here 
the duchy of East Prussia cut deeply into Polish territory. 
Poland, with its artificial frontiers, lacked geographical unity. 

Poland was not racially compact. Besides Poles and Lithu- 
anians, the inhabitants included many Russians, a considerable 
number of Germans and Swedes, and a large inhabitants 
Jewish population in the towns. The differences of Poland 
between them in race and language were accentuated by reli- 
gious dissensions. The Poles and most of the Lithuanians 
belonged to the Roman Catholic Church, the Germans and 
Swedes adhered to Lutheianism, while the Russians accepted 
the Orthodox faith. 

Feudalism, though almost extinct in western Social 

Europe, flourished in Poland. There were more conditions 
^ ' in Poland 

than a million Polish nobles, mostly very poor, 

but each one owning a share of the land. No large and wealthy 



316 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 




Partitions of Poland, 1772, 1793, 1795 a.d. 

middle class existed. The peasants were miserable serfs, over 
whom their lords had the power of life and death. 

The Polish monarchy was elective, not hereditary, an ar- 
rangement which converted the kings into mere puppets of 
Political ^ e n °bl e electors. A Polish sovereign could 

conditions neither make war or peace, nor pass laws, nor 
in Poland ^yy taxes without the consent of the Polish na- 
tional assembly. In this body, which was composed of repre- 
sentatives of the nobility, any member by his single adverse 
vote — "I object" — could block proposed legislation. The 
result was that the nobles seldom passed any measures except 
those which increased their own power and privileges. The 
wonder is, not that Poland collapsed, but that it survived so 
long under such a system of government. 



The Partitions of Poland 



317 




The Partition of Poland 

A contemporary cartoon which represents Catherine II, Joseph II, and Frederick II point- 
ing out On the map the boundaries of Poland as divided between them. Stanislaus II, the 
Polish king, is trying to keep his crown from falling off his head. 

Russia, Austria, and Prussia had long interfered in the choice 
of Polish rulers. Now they began to annex Polish territory. 
It was not necessary to conquer the country, but First parti . 
only to divide it up like a thing ownerless and dead, tion, 1772 
In 1772 Catherine II joined with Maria Theresa and Frederick 
the Great in the first partition of Poland. Russia took a strip 
east of the Diina and Dnieper rivers inhabited entirely by 
Russians. Austria took Galicia and neighboring lands occupied 



318 The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 

by Poles and Russians. Prussia received the coveted West 
Prussia, whose inhabitants were mainly Germans. All together 
Poland lost about one-third of its territory. 

The first partition opened the eyes of the Polish nobles to the 
ruin which threatened their country. Something like a patriotic 
Second spirit now developed, and efforts began to remove 

and third the glaring absurdities of the old government. The 

J_ °°f ' reform movement encountered the opposition of 
the neighboring sovereigns, who wished to keep. 
Poland as weak as possible in order to have an excuse for further 
spoliation. The second partition (1793), in which only Russia 
and Prussia shared, cut deeply into Poland. Two years later 
came the final dismemberment of the country among its three 
neighbors. The brave though futile resistance of the Polish 
patriots, led by Kosciuszko, who had fought under Washington 
in the Revolutionary War, threw a gleam of glory upon the last 
days of the expiring kingdom. 

Neither Great Britain nor France interfered in 1772 to save the 
Non- Poles. Great Britain was fully occupied with her 

intervention rebellious American colonies, while France, then 
ruled by the wretched Louis XV, had for the time being lost 
all weight in the councils of Europe. 

The suggestion for the dismemberment of Poland came from 
Frederick the Great, who with his usual frankness admitted 
The Polish that it was an act of brigands. In Catherine II 
Question ne f oun( j an ally as unprincipled as himself. Maria 
Theresa expressed horror at the crime and even declared that 
it would remain a blot on her whole reign. "She wept indeed, 
but she took." This shameful violation of international law 
produced a Polish Question. From the eighteenth century 
to the twentieth century the Poles never ceased to be restless 
and unhappy under foreign overlords. They developed a 
new national consciousness after the loss of their freedom, and 
the severest measures of repression failed to break their spirit. 
The restoration of Poland as an independent country was one 
happy result of the World War. 



The Partitions of Poland 319 

Studies 

1. What circumstances gave rise to (a) the Petition of Right; (b) the Instru- 
ment of Government ; (c) the Habeas Corpus Act ; (d) the Bill of Rights ; and (e) 
the Act of Settlement? 2. Contrast the Commonwealth as a national republic 
with the medieval Italian cities, the Swiss Confederation, and the United Nether- 
lands. 3. Why has the Bill of Rights been called the "third great charter of Eng- 
lish liberty"? What were the first and second charters? 4. Show that the Revo- 
lution of 1688-16S9 was a "preserving" and not a "destroying" revolution. 5. 
Trace the downfall of divine right as a political doctrine in seventeenth-century 
England. 6. What is the essential distinction between a "limited" or "constitu- 
tional" monarchy and an "absolute" or " autocratic" monarchy? 7. By refer- 
ence to the map on page 298, show how far the " natural boundaries " of France were 
attained during the reign of Louis XIV. 8. Show that by the Peace of Utrecht 
nearly all the combatants profited at the expense of Spain. 9. Compare the map of 
Europe in 1648 with that of Europe in 1713. Which states present the most marked 
changes in boundaries? 10. How was Russia until the time of Peter the Great 
rather an "annex of Asia" than a part of Europe? n. "Russia is the last-born 
child of European civilization." Comment on this statement. 12. What did 
Peter the Great mean by saying, "It is not land I want, but water"? 13. On an 
outline map indicate the territorial gains made by Russia in Europe under Peter 
the Great. 14. On the map (page 303) indicate the Russian acquisitions from 
Sweden, Poland, and Turkey, respectively, to the end of the eighteenth century. 

15. Account for the development of both absolutism and militarism in Prussia. 

16. On an outline map indicate the additions to the Hohenzollern territories made 
by Frederick the Great. 17. Why may the Polish state be described as both a 
monarchy and a republic? 18. Compare Russia's share of Poland with the shares 
of Austria and Prussia (map on page 316). 19. Show that the geographical situ- 
ation of West Prussia made it an extremely important addition to the Hohenzollern 
possessions. 20. Compare the map of Europe in 1789 with that of Europe in 
1713. Which states present the most marked changes in boundaries? 21. What 
illustrations of international immorality are found in this chapter? 



-s CHAPTER IX 

COMMERCE AND COLONIES DURING THE SEVEN- 
TEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES 1 

80. Mercantilism and Trading Companies 

Portugal and Spain had chiefly profited by the geographical 
discoveries and colonizing movements of the sixteenth century. 
New rivals The decline of these two countries enabled 
for colonial other European nations to step into their 
place as rivals for commerce, colonies, and the 
sovereignty of the seas. The Dutch were first in the field, 
followed later by the French and the English. 

Many motives inspired the colonizing movement of the 
seventeenth century. Political aims had considerable weight. 
Motives for Holland, France, and England wanted depend- 
coiomzation enc i es overseas as a counterpoise to those obtained 
by Portugal and Spain. The religious impulse also played a 
part, as when Jesuit missionaries penetrated the American 
wilderness to convert the Indians to Christianity and when 
the Pilgrim Fathers sought in the New World a refuge from 
persecution. But the main motive for colonization was eco- 
nomic in character. Colonies were planted in order to furnish 
the home land with raw materials for its manufactures, new 
markets, and favorable opportunities for the investment of 
capital in commerce and industry. 

Most European statesmen at this time accepted the prin- 
ciples of the mercantile system. Mercantilism is the name 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter xxix, "The Abo- 
rigines of the Pacific." Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 3, "Mayflower Com- 
pact, 1620"; No. 5, "New England Confederation, 1643"; No. 10, "Resolutions 
of the Stamp Act Congress, 1765 " ; No. 11, "Virginia Bill of Rights, 1776" ; No. 12, 
"Declaration of Independence, 1776"; No. 13, "Articles of Confederation, 1778 "; 
No. 14, "Northwest Ordinance, 1787"; No. 15, "Constitution of the United States, 
1787." 

320 



Mercantilism and Trading Companies 321 

given to an economic doctrine which emphasized the importance 
of manufactures and foreign trade, rather than agriculture and 
domestic trade, as sources of national wealth. The 
Some Mercantilists even argued that the pros- mercantile 
perity of a nation is in exact proportion to the sys 
amount of money in circulation within its borders. They 
urged, therefore, that each country should so conduct its 
dealings with other countries as to attract to itself the largest 
possible share of the precious metals. This could be most 
easily done by fostering exports of manufactures, through 
bounties and special privileges, and by discouraging imports, 
except of raw materials. If the country sold more to foreigners 
than it bought of them, then there would be a "favorable bal- 
ance of trade," and this balance the foreigners would have to 
make up in coin or bullion. 

Large and flourishing colonies seemed essential to the success 
of the mercantile system. Colonies were viewed simply as 

estates to be worked for the advantage of the ., .... 

Mercantilism 

country fortunate enough to possess them. The and colonial 
home government did its best to prevent other P° lic y 
governments from trading with its dependencies. At the same 
time, it either prohibited or placed serious restrictions on colonial 
manufactures which might compete with those of the mother 
country. Portugal and Spain in the sixteenth century, and 
now Holland, France, and England in the seventeenth century, 
pursued this colonial policy. 

The home government did not itself engage in colonial 
commerce. It ceded this privilege to private com- x rac iing 
panies organized for the purpose. A company, companies 
in return for the monopoly of trade with the inhabitants of a 
colony, was expected to govern and protect them. 

The first form of association was the regulated company. 
Each member, after paying the entrance fee, traded Rp ulated 
with his own capital at his own risk and kept his and joint- 
profits to himself. After a time this loose associ- stock . 
r w companies 

ation gave way to the joint-stock company. The 

members contributed to a common fund and, instead of 



322 Commerce and Colonies 

trading themselves, intrusted the management of the business 
to a board of directors. Any one who invested his capital 
would then receive a "dividend" on his "shares" of the joint 
stock, provided the enterprise was successful. The joint- 
stock companies of the seventeenth century thus formed a 
connecting link with modern corporations. 

Trading companies were very numerous. For instance, 
Holland, France, England, Sweden and Denmark, as well as 
Scotland and Prussia, each chartered its own 
trading "East India Company." England had many 

companies trading companies, particularly those which oper- 
ated in the Baltic lands, Russia, Turkey, India, Morocco, 
West Africa, and North America. 

81. The Dutch Colonial Empire 

Holland lies at the mouths of the largest rivers of western 
Europe, ths Scheldt, Meuse, and Rhine, thus securing easy 

„ „ , communication with the interior. It is not far 
Holland as 

a commer- distant from Denmark and Norway and is only 

power a £ ew houj-g' sa ji f rom the French and English 

coasts. These advantages of position, combined with a small, 
infertile territory, never capable of supporting more than a 
fraction of the inhabitants by agriculture, naturally turned 
the Dutch to the Sea. They began their maritime career as 
fishermen, "exchanging tons of herring for tons of gold." and 
gradually built up an extensive transport trade between the 
Mediterranean and the Baltic lands. After the discovery of the 
Cape route to the East Indies, Dutch traders met Portuguese 
merchants at Lisbon and there obtained spices and other 
eastern wares for distribution throughout Europe. 1 

But the Dutch were soon to become seamen on a much more 
extensive scale. The union of Portugal with Spain in 1581 2 
Dutch e d' ena t>led Philip II to close the port of Lisbon to 
tions to the the Netherlanders, who had already begun their 
revolt against the Spanish monarch. Philip also 
seized a large number of Dutch ships lying in Spanish and 

1 See page 254. 2 Dissolved in 1640. 



The Dutch Colonial Empire 323 

Portuguese harbors, thus disclosing his purpose to destroy, 
if possible, the profitable commerce of his enemies. The Dutch 
now began to make expeditions directly to the East Indies, 
whose trade had been monopolized by Portugal for almost 
a century. They captured many Portuguese and Spanish 
ships, obtained ports on the coasts of Africa and India, and 
established themselves securely in the Far East. 

The Dutch government presently chartered the East India 
Company and gave to it the monopoly of trade and rule from 
the Cape of Good Hope eastward to the Strait Dutch 
of Magellan. The company operated chiefly in the East India 
rich islands of the Malay Archipelago. Here 
much bitter fighting took place with the Portuguese, who 
were finally driven from nearly all of their eastern posses- 
sions. Ceylon, Malacca, Sumatra, Java, Celebes, and the 
Moluccas, or Spice Islands, passed into the hands of the Dutch. 
The headquarters of the Dutch East India Company were 
located at Batavia in Java. This city still remains one of the 
leading commercial centers of the Far East. 

The Dutch possessions included the Cape of Good Hope, 
where the Dutch East India Company made a permanent 
settlement (Cape Town). It was intended, at The Dutch 
first, to be simply a way-station or port of refresh- in South 
ment for ships on the route to the Indies. Before 
long, however, Dutch emigrants began to arrive in increasing 
numbers, together with Huguenots who had fled from France 
to escape persecution. These farmer-settlers, or Boers, passed 
slowly into the interior and laid there the foundation of Dutch 
sway in South Africa. The Cape of Good Hope became a 
British possession at the opening of the nineteenth century, 
but the Boer republics retained their independence until our 
own day. 

Fired by their success and enriched by their gains in the 
East, the Dutch started out to form another colonial empire 
in the West. It was a Dutchman, Henry Hudson, The Dutch 
who, seeking a northwest passage to the East in Amenca 
Indies, discovered in 1609 the river which bears his name. The 



3 2 4 



Commerce and Colonies 



Dutch sent out ships to trade with the natives and built a fort 
on Manhattan Island. The Dutch West India Company soon 
received a charter for commerce and colonization between the 
west coast of Africa and the east coast of the Americas. The 
company's little station on Manhattan Island became the 
flourishing port of New Amsterdam, from which the Dutch 




New Amsterdam in 1655 

After Van der Donck's New Netherland. 

settlement of New Netherland spread up the Hudson River. 
The company also secured a large part of Guiana, as well as 
some of the West Indies. 

The Dutch in the seventeenth century were the leaders of 
commercial Europe. They owned more merchant ships than 
Commercial an y other people and almost monopolized the 
decline of carrying trade from the East Indies and between 
the Mediterranean and the Baltic. Yet with the 
advent of the eighteenth century the Dutch had begun to fall 
behind their French and English rivals in the race for commerce 
and colonies. They suffered from trade warfare with England 
during the Commonwealth and the reign of Charles II. The 
long and exhausting War of the Spanish Succession, in which 
Holland was a member of the Grand Alliance against Louis 
XIV, struck a further blow at Dutch prosperity. Though 
Holland fell from the first rank of commercial states, it has 
kept most of its dominions overseas to the present time. 



Rivalry of France and England in India 325 

82. Rivalry of France and England in India (to 1763) 

The Portuguese and Dutch enjoyed a profitable trade with 
India, which supplied them with cotton, indigo, spices, dyes, 
drugs, precious stones, and other articles of i n di a and 
luxury in European demand. In the seventeenth Eur ope 
century, however, the French and the English became the princi- 
pal competitors for Indian trade, and in the eighteenth century 
the rivalry between them led to the defeat of the French and the 
secure establishment of England's rule over India. A region 
half as large as Europe began to pass under the control of a 
single European power. 

The conquest of India was made possible by the decline of 
the Mogul (or Mongol) Empire, which had been founded by 
the Turkish chieftain Baber in the sixteenth cen- India under 
tury. That empire, though renowned for its the Moguls 
pomp and magnificence, never achieved a real unification 
of India. The country continued to be a collection of separate 
provinces, whose inhabitants were isolated from one another by 
differences of race, language, and religion. The Indian peoples 
had no feeling of nationality, and when the Mogul Empire 
broke up they were ready, with perfect indifference, to accept 
any other government able to keep -order among them. 

Neither France nor England began by making annexations 
in India. Each country merely established an East India 
company, giving to it a monopoly of trade between The East 
India and the home land. The French company, India 
chartered during the reign of Louis XIV, had its compar 
headquarters at Pondicherry, on the southeastern coast of 
India. The English company, which received its first charter 
from Queen Elizabeth, possessed three widely separated settle- 
ments at Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta. 

The French were the first to attempt the task of empire 
making in India, under the leadership of Dupleix, the able 
governor-general of Pondicherry. Dupleix saw 
clearly that the dissolution of the Mogul Empire 
and the defenseless condition of the native states opened the 



326 



Commerce and Colonies 




way to the European conquest of India. In order that the 
French should profit by this unique opportunity, he entered 
into alliance with some of the Indian princes, fortified Pondi- 



Rivalry of France and England in India 327 

cherry, and managed to form an army by enlisting native sol- 
diers ("sepoys"), who were drilled by French officers. The 
English afterwards did the same thing, and to this day "se- 
poys" comprise the bulk of the Indian forces of Great Britain. 
Upon the outbreak of the War of the Austrian Succession the 
French captured Madras, but it was restored to the English by 
the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. Dupleix continued, however, 
to extend French influence in the south and east of India. 

The English could not look unconcernedly upon the progress 
of their French rivals, and it was a young Englishman, Robert 
Clive, whose genius checkmated Dupleix's am- 
bitious schemes. To Clive, more than any other 
man, Great Britain owes the beginning of her present Indian 
Empire. Clive had been a clerk in the employ of the East 
India Company at Madras, but he soon got an ensign's com- 
mission and entered upon a military career. His first success 
was gained in southeastern India. Here he managed to over- 
throw an upstart prince whom Dupleix supported and to 
restore English influence in that part of the peninsula. Dupleix 
was recalled in disgrace to France, where he died a disappointed 
man. 

Clive now found an opportunity for even greater service. 

The native ruler of Bengal, a man ferocious in temper and 

consumed with hatred of the English, suddenlv „ „, . 

' J Battle of 

captured Calcutta. He allowed one hundred and piassey, 
forty-six prisoners to be confined in a tiny room, 1757 
where they passed the sultry night without water. Next 
morning only twenty-three came forth alive from the "Black 
Hole." This atrocity was sufficiently avenged by the wonder- 
ful victory of Piassey, in which Clive, with a handful of soldiers, 
overthrew an Indian army of fifty thousand men. Piassey 
showed conclusively that native troops were no match for 
Europeans and made the English masters of Bengal, with its 
rich delta, mighty rivers, and teeming population. 

Meanwhile, the outbreak of the Seven Years' War in Europe 
renewed the contest between France and England on Indian 
soil. The English were completely successful, for their control 



$2% Commerce and Colonies 

of the sea prevented the French government from sending 
reinforcements to India. France recovered her territorial pos- 
The Seven sessions by the Peace of Paris in 1763, but agreed 
Years' War not to fortify them. This meant that she gave 
up her dream of an empire in India. England 
henceforth enjoyed a free hand in shaping the destinies of that 
vast region. 



83. Rivalry of France and England in North America 
(to 1763) 

Englishmen, under the Tudors, had done very little as col- 
onizers of the New World. Henry VII, indeed, encouraged 
Lateness J onn Cabot to make the discoveries of 1497-1498, 

of English n which the English claims to North America 
were based. During Elizabeth's reign Sir Martin 
Frobisher explored the coasts of Greenland and Labrador, 
and another " sea-dog," Sir Humphrey Gilbert, sought with- 
out success to colonize Newfoundland. Gilbert's half-brother, 
Sir Walter Raleigh, planned a settlement in the region then 
called Virginia, 1 but lack of support from home caused it to 
perish miserably. The truth was that sixteenth-century Eng- 
lishmen had first to break the power of Spain in Europe before 
they could give much attention to America. The destruc- 
tion of the Spanish Armada in 1588 at length enabled them to 
establish American colonies without interference from Spain. 

The first permanent settlements of Englishmen in America 
were made at Jamestown, Virginia (1607), and Plymouth (1620), 
The Thirteen during the reign of James I. The reign of Charles I 
Colonies gaw ^ foundation of Massachusetts and Maryland, 

and that of Charles II, the foundation of Pennsylvania and the 
Carolinas. By the end of the seventeenth century Massachu- 
setts had absorbed Plymouth and had thrown out the offshoots 
which presently became Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New 
Hampshire. The Dutch colony of New Netherland soon passed 
into the hands of the English and became New York. Charles II 

1 After Elizabeth, the "Virgin Queen." 



Rivalry of France and England in North America 329 

granted it to his brother James, duke of York and Albany, who 
afterwards reigned as James II. James, in turn, bestowed 
the region between the Hudson and Delaware rivers upon 
two court favorites, and it received the name of New Jersey. 
The small Swedish settlement on the Delaware, which had 
been established by the South Company of Sweden, under the 
auspices of Gustavus Adolphus, was annexed by the Dutch 
and then by the English. Delaware subsequently became a 
separate colony. Georgia, the southernmost of the Thirteen 
Colonies, was not settled until the reign of George II, in whose 
honor it was named. 

Both New England and the southern colonies were chiefly 
English in blood. Many emigrants also came from other 
parts of the British Isles. The emigrants from Anglo-Saxon 
Continental Europe included French Huguenots ex P ansion 
and Germans from the Rhenish Palatinate. The popula- 
tion of the middle colonies was far more mixed. Besides Eng- 
lish and a sprinkling of Scotch and Irish, it comprised Dutch 
in New York, Swedes in Delaware, and Germans in Pennsyl- 
vania. But neither France, Holland, Sweden, nor Germany 
contributed largely to the settlement of the Thirteen Colonies. 

The French at the opening of the seventeenth century had 
gained no foothold in the New World. For more than fifty 
years after the failure of Jacques Cartier's settle- Lateness of 
ment near Quebec (1542), they were so occupied French 
with the Huguenot wars that they gave little 
thought to colonial expansion. The single exception was the 
ill-starred colony which Admiral de Coligny attempted to es- 
tablish in Florida (1564). The Spaniards quickly destroyed 
it, not only because the settlers were Protestants, but also be- 
cause a French settlement in Florida directly threatened their 
West India possessions. The growing weakness of Spain, 
together with the cessation of the religious struggle, made 
possible a renewal of the colonizing movement. The French 
again turned to the north, attracted by the fur trade and the 
fisheries, and founded Canada during the same decade that the 
English were founding Virginia. 



33° Commerce and Colonies 

The first great name in Canadian history is that of Samuel 
de Champlain, who enjoyed the patronage of Henry IV. 
Champiain Champlain explored the coast of Maine and Massa- 
and Canada c husetts, discovered the beautiful lake now called 
after him, traced the course of the St. Lawrence River, and also 
came upon lakes Ontario and Huron. He set up a permanent 
French post at Quebec in 1608, and three years later founded 
Montreal. 

During the reign of Louis XIV the exploration of Canada 
went on with renewed energy. The French, hitherto, had been 
La Salle and spurred by the hope of finding in the Great Lakes 
Louisiana a western passage to Cathay. Joliet, the fur trader, 
and Marquette, the Jesuit missionary, believed that they had 
actually found the highway uniting the Atlantic and the Pacific, 
when their birchbark canoes first glided into the upper Mis- 
sissippi. It was reserved for the most illustrious of French 
explorers, Robert de La Salle, to discover the true character 
of the "Father of Waters" and to perform the feat of descend- 
ing it to the sea. He took possession of all the territory drained 
by the Mississippi for Louis XIV, naming it Louisiana. 

Where La Salle had shown the way, missionaries, fur traders 

hunters, and adventurers quickly followed. The French now 

began to realize the importance of the Missis- 
New France . 

sippi Valley, which time was to prove the most 

extensive fertile area in the world. Efforts were made to occupy 
it and to connect it with Canada by a chain of forts reaching 
from Quebec and Montreal on the St. Lawrence to New Or- 
leans 1 at the mouth of the Mississippi. All of the continent 
west of the Alleghenies was to become New France. 

However audacious this design, it seemed not impossible 
of fulfillment. New France, a single royal province under one 
Strength and military governor, offered a united front to the 
weakness of divided English colonies. The population, though 
small compared with the number of the English 
colonists, consisted mostly of men of military age, good fighters, 

1 Named after the Due d'Orleans, who was regent of France during the minority 
of Louis XV. See page 302, note 1. 



Rivalry of France and England in North America 331 

and aided by numerous Indian allies. Lack of home support 
largely offset these real advantages. While the French were 
contending for colonial supremacy, they were constantly at 
war in Europe. They wasted on European battle-fields the 
resources which might otherwise have been expended in America. 
Furthermore, the despotism of Louis XIV and Louis XV 
hampered private enterprise in New France by vexatious re- 
strictions on trade and industry, and at the same time deprived 
the inhabitants of training in self-government. The French 
settlers never breathed the air of liberty, while the English 
colonists in political matters were left almost entirely to them- 
selves. The failure of France to become a world-power at this 
time must be ascribed, therefore, chiefly to the unfortunate 
policies of her rulers. 

The struggle between France and England began, both in 
the Old World and the New, in 1689, when the " Glorious Revo- 
lution" drove out James II and placed William A new 
of Orange on the English throne as William III. Hundred 

Vgarc' "WoF 

The Dutch and English, who had previously 
been enemies, now became friends and united in resistance to 
Louis XIV. The French king not only threatened the Dutch, 
but also incensed the English by receiving the fugitive James 
and aiding him to win back his crown. England at once joined 
a coalition of the states of Europe against France. This 
was the beginning of a new Hundred Years' War between the 
two countries. 1 The struggle extended beyond the Continent, 
for each of the rivals tried to destroy the commerce and annex 
the colonies of the other. 

The first period of conflict closed in 17 13, with the Peace of 
Utrecht. England secured Newfoundland, Acadia (rechristened 
Nova Scotia), and the extensive region drained by . . 

the rivers flowing into Hudson Bay. France, how- of the Peace 
ever, kept the best part of her American territories °* Utrecht, 
and retained control of the St. Lawrence and the 
Mississippi. The possession of these two waterways gave her 
a strong strategic position in the interior of the continent. 

1 Sec the chart on page 332. 



332 



Commerce and Colonies 



The two great European wars which came between 1740 and 
1763 were naturally reflected in the New World. The War of 
the Austrian Succession, known in American 
history as King George's War, proved to be 
indecisive. The Seven Years' War, similarly 
known as the French and Indian War, resulted 
in the expulsion of the French from North America. 
France had no resources to cope with those of England in 
America, and the English command of the sea proved decisive. 



King 
George's 
War and the 
French and 
Indian War 



European and Colonial Wars, i 689-1 783 



[In Europe 


Dates 


Contestants 


Treaty 


In America 


War of the 


1689-1697 


France vs. Great 


Ryswick 


King Wil- 


League of 




Britain, Hol- 




liam's War 


Augsburg 




land, Spain, 
Austria, 
Sweden, etc. 






War of the 


1701-1713 


France, Spain, 


Utrecht and 


Queen 


Spanish 




Bavaria vs. 


Rastatt 


Anne's 


Succession 




Great Britain, 
Holland, Aus- 
tria, Portugal, 
Savoy, Prus- 
sia, etc. 




War 


War of the 


1 740-1 748 


Prussia, France, 


Aix-la- 


King 


Austrian 




Spain, Bavaria 


Chapelle 


George's 


Succession 




vs. Austria, 
Great Britain, 
Holland 




War 
(i744- 

1748) 


Seven Years' 


1756-1763 


Prussia, Great 


Paris and 


French and 


War 




Britain vs. 


Hubertus- 


Indian 






Austria, France, 


burg 


War 






Russia, Sweden, 




(i754- 






Saxony 




1763) 


War of the 


1 7 76-1 783 


Great Britain vs. 


Paris and 




American 




United States, 


Versailles 




Revolution 




France, Spain, 
Holland 







Rivalry of France and England in North America 333 

One French post after another was captured. Wolfe de- 
feated the gallant Montcalm under the walls of Quebec and 
the fall of that stronghold quickly followed. What remained 
of the French army at Montreal also surrendered. The British 
flag was now raised over Canada, where it has flown ever 
since. 




Quebec 

After an old engraving. 

The second period of conflict closed in 1763, with the Peace 
of Paris. France ceded to England all her North American 
possessions east of the Mississippi, except two _ . . 

„ . . Provisions 

small islands kept for fishing purposes off the coast of the 

of Newfoundland. Spain, which had also been ^ eace <°L„ 
1 ' Pans, 1763 

involved in the war, gave up Florida to England, 
receiving as compensation the French territories west of the 
Mississippi. New France was now only a memory. But 
modern Canada has two millions of Frenchmen, who still hold 
aloof from the British in language and religion, while Loui- 
siana, though shrunk to the dimensions of an American state, 
still retains in its laws and in many customs of its people the 
French tradition. 

The Peace of Paris marked a turning point in the history 
of the Thirteen Colonies. Relieved of pressure from without 



334 Commerce and Colonies 

and free to expand toward the west and south, they now felt 
less keenly their dependence on England. Close ties, the ties 
England and °f common interests, common ideals, and a common 
the Thirteen origin, still attached them to the mother country ; 
but these were soon to be rudely severed during 
the period of disturbance, disorder, and violence which culmi- 
nated in the American Revolution. 

84. The American Revolution, 1776-1783 

Englishmen in the New World for a long time had been 
drawing apart from Englishmen in the Old World. The politi- 
Preparation ca ^ training received by the colonists in their local 
for inde- meetings and provincial assemblies fitted them for 

self-government, while the hard conditions of life 
in America fostered their energy, self-reliance, and impatience 
of restraint. The important part which they played in the 
conquest of Canada gave them confidence in their military 
abilities and showed them the value of cooperation. Renewed 
interference of Great Britain in what they deemed their private 
concerns before long called forth their united resistance. 

Some of the grievances of which the colonists complained 
were the outcome of the British colonial policy. The home 
Restrictions government discouraged the manufacture in the 
on colonial colonies of goods that could be made in England, 
manu ac ures p ar ^ amentj f or instance, prohibited the export 
of woolens, not only to the British Isles and the Continent, 
but also from one colony to another, and forbade the colonists 
to set up mills for making wrought iron or its finished products. 
Such regulations aimed to give British manufacturers a monop- 
oly of the colonial markets. 

The home government also interfered with the commerce of 
the colonies. As early as 1660 Parliament passed a " Navi- 
Restrictions gation Act" providing that sugar, tobacco, cotton, 
on colonial and indigo might not be exported direct from the 
colonies to foreign countries, but must be first 
brought to England, where duties were paid on them. A sub- 
sequent act required all imports into the colonies from Conti- 



The American Revolution 335 

nental Europe to have been actually shipped from an English 
port, thus compelling the colonists to go to England for their 
supplies. These acts, however, were so poorly enforced for 
many years that smuggling became a lucrative occupation. 

All this legislation was not so repressive as one would suppose, 
partly because it was so constantly evaded and partly because 
Great Britain formed the natural market for most Alleviations 
colonial products. Moreover, the home govern- and com- 
ment gave some special favors in the shape of pensa 10ns 
"bounties," or sums of money to encourage the production of 
food and raw materials needed in Great Britain. Twenty- 
four colonial industries were subsidized in 
this manner. Colonial shipping was also 
fostered, for ships built in the colonies en- 
joyed the same exclusive privileges in the 
carrying trade as British-built ships. In 
fact, the regulations which the American 
colonists had to endure were light, com- 
pared with the shackles laid by Spain and 
France upon their colonial possessions. It ^^ "MiS 

must always be remembered, finally, that , „ 

... A Stamp of 1765 

Great Britain defended the colonists in 

return for trade privileges. As long as her help was needed 
against the French, they did not protest seriously against the 
legislation of Parliament. 

After the close of the Seven Years' War George III and his 
ministers determined to keep British troops in America as a 
protection against outbreaks by the French or 
Indians. The colonists, to whose safety an army Act and 
would add, were expected to pay for its partial t] ? e J ?^ n ' 
support. Parliament, accordingly, took steps to 
enforce the laws regulating colonial commerce and also passed 
the Stamp Act (1765). The protests of the colonists led to the 
repeal of this obnoxious measure, but it was soon replaced by 
the Townshend Acts (1767), levying duties on certain commodi- 
ties imported into America. These acts, in turn, were repealed 
three years later. Parliament, however, kept a small duty on 




336 



Commerce and Colonies 



" No tax- 
ation with- 
out repre- 
sentation " 



tea, in order that the colonists might not think that it had 
abandoned its assumed right to tax them. 

The Stamp Act and the Townshend Acts thus brought up 
the whole question as to the extent of parliamentary control 
over the colonists. They argued that taxes could 
be rightfully voted only by their own representative 
assemblies. It was a natural attitude for them 
to take, since Parliament, sitting three thousand 
miles away, had little insight into American affairs. The 

British view was that Parlia- 
ment "virtually" represented 
all Englishmen and hence 
might tax them wherever 
they lived. This view can 
also be understood, for the 
"Glorious Revolution" had 
definitely established the su- 
premacy of Parliament in 
England. 1 In any case, how- 
ever, taxation of the colonies 
was clearly contrary to cus- 
tom and very impolitic in 
the face of the popular feeling 
which it aroused in America. 
Some British statesmen 
themselves espoused the cause 
of the colonists. 
Edmund Burke, 
the great Irish 

orator, declared that the idea of a virtual representation of 
America in Parliament was "the most contemptible idea that 
ever entered the head of a man." Even William Pitt (then 
earl of Chatham), while maintaining the right of Parliament 
to legislate for America, applauded the "manly wisdom and 
calm resolution" displayed by the colonists. But these were 
the voices of a minority, of a helpless minority. Parliament 

1 See page 204. 




George III 

After a painting by John Zoffany in 
Buckingham Palace, London. 



Attitude 
of British 
statesmen 



The American Revolution 337 

was then utterly unrepresentative of the people and was packed 
with the supporters of George III (the "king's friends"). To 
this would-be despot, therefore, belongs the chief responsibility 
for the measures of oppression which provoked the resistance 
of the Thirteen Colonies. 

The colonists were so opposed to the principle of parliamen- 
tary taxation that they refused to buy tea from British 
merchants and in Boston even boarded a tea Declaration 
ship and threw the cargo into the water. Parlia- ° f Independ- 
ment replied to the " Boston Tea Party " by closing 
the harbor of that city to commerce and by depriving Mas- 
sachusetts of self-government. These measures, instead of 

X/hjUTi. *TV irUL. t-m^U. fl Lu-rruv*. u*li/ [A (urm<J axu/m^v far K tr^rfrO- G 

f-' 1 1 / ■ • H ' '■-■' * ii •' U 1 ' ,»■■ Aitt eA ■■ n , ' , „ mf, V i% ) ir 

to if*. vjyvrJir~a J) tnturjurtd x^A^ fLaJt ih^ j'kn^ 4m*JU*<. ™*- cax^t*^ . 
\JKitM. <yn^rt*X. "nam ~to M< i j i 'm y. j&f*€u*+ALuor\. 

c^vc^it? t^u^t y < j >— ( t ]iiw * j un i t • n ~ t n L~~ ±JGZ 2EZ£Z 3£ » > < » r e g . ^<C« ^"iA j . Pv ,aj 

~< f l , ' f '" ," t~*~~ g). rL 9 AC,,#** % ^^_-—ll~* ^f ^ 

Opening Lines of the Declaration of Independence 

A reduced facsimile of the first lines of Jefferson's original draft. 

bringing the recalcitrant colony to terms, only aroused the 
apprehension of her neighbors and led to the meeting of 
delegates from all the colonies, except Georgia, in the First 
Continental Congress. It recommended a policy of non- 
intercourse with Great Britain until the colonists had recovered 
their "just rights and liberties." The Second Congress, which 
met after blood had been shed at Lexington and Concord, pre- 
pared for war and appointed George Washington to command 



338 Commerce and Colonies 

the colonial forces. On July 4, 1776, after the failure of all 
plans for conciliation with the mother country, it declared that 
"these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and 
independent states." 

No colony at first contained a large majority in favor of 
separation, and even after the Declaration of Independence 
The numerous loyalists, or "Tories," continued to 

' Tones " espouse the British cause. After the conclusion 
of peace the "Tories" emigrated in great numbers to Canada, 
where they were the first English settlers. They prospered in 
their new home, and their descendants, who form a consider- 
able part of the Canadian population, are to-day among the 
most devoted members of the British Empire. 

Even had the colonists been unanimous in resistance to 
Great Britain, they stood little chance of winning against a 
The French wealthy country with a population nearly three 
alliance, times their own, trained armies supported by Ger- 

man mercenaries, and a powerful navy. When, 
however, the resources of France were thrown into the scale, 
the issue became less doubtful. France, still smarting from 
the losses incurred in the Seven Years' War, desired to recover 
as much as possible of her colonial dominion and secretly 
aided the Americans with money and supplies for some time 
before the victory at Saratoga led her to enter into a formal 
alliance with them. 

The war now merged into a European conflict, in which 
France was joined by Spain and Holland. Great Britain 
needed all her reserve power to prevent rebellion 
the Revo- in Ireland, defend Gibraltar, and keep her pos- 
War 113 ^ sessions in the West Indies and India. The 

struggle in America practically closed in 178 1, when 
Cornwallis, blockaded at Yorktown by a French fleet and 
closely invested by the combined French and American armies, 
surrendered the largest British force still in the colonies. Nearly 
two years passed, however, before the contestants made peace. 

The Treaty of Paris between Great Britain and the United 
States recognized the independence of the former Thirteen 



The American Revolution 



339 



11U" 100° 90" S0° 70 




United States 

| British Possessions 

I Spanish Possessions 

I French Possessions 

I I Russian. Possessions 

Du.c "Dutch Dau. = Danish 



110° Longitude 100° West from 90° Greenwich 80 



North America after the Peace of Paris, 1783 a.d. 



Colonies and fixed their boundaries at Canada and the 
Great Lakes, the Atlantic Ocean, Florida, and Treaties of 

pqrjc onrj 

the Mississippi River. The Treaty of Versailles Versailles 
between Great Britain, France, and Spain re- 1783 
stored to France a few colonial possessions and gave to Spain 



340 



Commerce and Colonies 



the island of Minorca 1 and the Florida territory. 2 Holland, 
which concluded a separate peace with Great Britain, was 
obliged to cede to that country some stations in India and to 
throw open to British merchants the valuable trade of the 
East Indies. 

The successful revolt of the Thirteen Colonies dealt a stag- 
gering blow at the old colonial policy. The Americans con- 
Effects of tinued to trade with the mother country from 
self-interest, although they were no longer com- 
pelled to do so by law. The result was that 
British commerce with the United States doubled within fifteen 



American 
independence 







Signatures of the Treaty of Paris, 1783 

From the original document in the Department of State, Washington. 

years after the close of the Revolutionary War. This formed 
an object-lesson in the futility of commercial restrictions. 

The American War of Independence reacted almost at 
once on Europe. The Declaration of Independence, setting 
America forth the "unalienable rights of man" as against 

teaching feudal privilege and oppression, provided ardent 

y examp e S pj r ^ s m France with a formula of liberty which 
they were not slow in applying to their own country. The 
French Revolution of 1789 was the child of the American 
Revolution. Early in the nineteenth century still another 
revolutionary movement stripped Spain and Portugal of all 



1 See page 302. 



2 See page 333. 



Formation of the United States 341 

their continental possessions in the New World. America 
was, indeed, teaching by example. 

85. Formation of the United States 

The Continental Congress, which had framed the Decla- 
ration of Independence in 1776, continued to govern the United 
States until the adoption of the Articles of Con- Articles of 
federation in 1781. The Articles established a Confedera- 
mere league of states, like the Dutch and Swiss con- 10n ' 1781 
federations. The authority of Congress was practically limited 
to war, peace, and foreign affairs. It could not levy taxes, 
could not regulate interstate commerce, and had no power to 
enforce obedience in either a state or an individual. Every 
attempt to amend the Articles by legislative action failed, and 
the weak and clumsy government which they had set up threat- 
ened to collapse. 

Such were the distressing circumstances under which the 
Federal Convention met at Philadelphia in May, 1787. To this 
body the states sent fifty-five delegates, including The Federal 
Washington, who presided, Franklin, James Madi- Convention, 
son, and Alexander Hamilton. Instead of merely 
amending the Articles, they decided to prepare an entirely 
new constitution, and accomplished the task within four months. 

Necessary though the Constitution was, if the American 

people were not to face anarchy and civil war, it satisfied 

neither the advocates of states' rights nor the _ _ u 

Ratification 

extreme democrats. Nearly a year elapsed before of the 
eleven states ratified the instrument. North P™* 1 """ 011 ' 

1787-1789 

Carolina and Rhode Island did not ratify it 

until after the inauguration of Washington as President in 

1789. 

The concessions made to the opponents of the Constitution, 
as originally framed, were embodied in the first ten amend- 
ments. These provided for religious freedom, the The first ten 
separation of Church and State, free speech, a amendments, 

1791 

free press, the privileges of assembly and petition, 

the right to bear arms, speedy and public jury trials, and other 



342 Commerce and Colonies 

safeguards of personal liberty. In short, the amendments 
were a Bill of Rights for the American people. 

The Constitution, in many features, reflects the political 
experience of the colonists and their familiarity with British 
Sources of methods of government. Accustomed to a bi- 
the Consti- cameral legislature, they retained this arrange- 
tution ment in the Senate and House of Representatives, 

but made the upper, as well as the lower, house elective. The 
President's powers of military command, appointment, and 
veto resembled those of the colonial governor, though here, 
again, the framers of the Constitution departed from precedent 
in making the executive elective. The national courts were 
modeled after those of the colonies. The Supreme Court, 
with its power of declaring acts of Congress unconstitutional, 
found a prototype in the Privy Council of Great Britain, which 
had formerly exercised the right of annulling acts of the colonial 
legislatures. It is noteworthy, however, that the Constitution 
contains no provision for the cabinet system, by which both 
executive and legislative functions are centered in the popular 
branch of the legislature. The cabinet system was quite un- 
known to the colonists and at this time was not fully developed 
in Great Britain. 

As a whole, the Constitution formed a novelty in politics. 
It established, for the first time in history, a federal union, 
The nation rather than a mere league of states or confeder- 
and the ation. The objects of the new government 

were concisely stated in the immortal preamble: 
"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more 
perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, pro- 
vide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and 
secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, 
do ordain and establish this constitution for the United States." 

86. Progress of Geographical Discovery 

Great Britain soon found at least partial compensation for 
the loss of the Thirteen Colonies in the occupation of Australia 
and the islands of the Pacific. That vast ocean, covering 



Progress of Geographical Discovery 343 

more than one-third of the globe, remained little known to 
Europeans until the latter part of the eighteenth century. 
Soon after Magellan's voyage the Spaniards estab- Ear i y ex _ 
lished a regular commercial route between Mexico pioration of 
and the Philippines and gradually discovered some 
of the archipelagoes which stud the intervening seas. Sir Francis 
Drake's circumnavigation of the world first drew the attention 
of Englishmen to the Pacific Ocean, but a long time passed be- 
fore they began its systematic exploration. 

The unveiling of the Pacific was closely connected with the 
Antarctic problem. Geographers from the time of the Greeks 
had a vague idea that a region of continental The •< Great 
proportions lay to the southeast of the Indian South 
Ocean. The idea found expression in Ptolemy's 
map of the world, and Marco Polo during his stay in China 
heard about it. After the Dutch became established in the 
East Indies, they made renewed search for the "Great South 
Land" and carefully explored the western coast of Australia 
or "New Holland." 

In 1642 the Dutch East India Company sent Abel Tasman 
from Batavia to investigate the real extent of Australia. Tas- 
man's two voyages — among the most notable on 
record — led to the discovery of Van Diemen's voyages, 
Land (Tasmania) and New Zealand, and proved ^f f ? 43 ' 
conclusively that Australia had no connection 
with the supposed Antarctic continent. The Dutch, however, 
manifested little interest in the regions which they had found, 
and more than one hundred years elapsed before Tasman's 
work was continued by Captain James Cook. 

This famous navigator, the son of a farm laborer, entered 

the British navy at an early age and by his unaided efforts 

rose to high command. Cook's first voyage in 

the Pacific resulted in the exploration of the coast voyages in 

of New Zealand and the eastern shore of Australia. the Pacific - 
_, , ,, , , , 1768 1779 

The second voyage anally settled the quest inn 

as to the existence of a southern continent, for Cook sailed three 

times across the Pacific Ocean without finding it. At the in- 



344 Commerce and Colonies 

stance of George III, Cook undertook a third voyage to locate, 
if possible, an opening on the coast of Alaska which would lead 
into Hudson Bay. He followed the American coast through 
Bering Strait until an unbroken ice field barred further progress. 
On the return from the Arctic region Cook visited the Hawaiian 
Islands, where he was murdered by the natives. Thus closed 
the career of one who, more than any othei explorer, revealed 
to European gaze the island world of the Pacific. 

Captain Cook on his third voyage was the first British navi- 
gator to sight Alaska. Here, however, he had been preceded 
. , by the Russians, who reached the Pacific by way 

voyages, of Siberia and the Arctic Ocean. It still remained 

1741 1729 ' uncertain whether Siberia did not join on to the 
northern part of the New World. Peter the 
Great, who showed a keen interest in geographical discovery, 
commissioned Vitus Bering, a Dane in the Russian service, 
to solve the problem. Bering explored the strait and sea 
named after him and made clear the relation between North 
America and Asia. 

The eighteenth century thus added greatly to man's knowl- 
edge of the world, especially in the Pacific area. Cook's voy- 
Scientific ages, in particular, left the main outlines of the 

exploration southern part of the globe substantially as they 
are known to-day. From this time systematic exploration 
for scientific purposes more and more took the place of voyages 
by private adventurers for the sake of warfare or plunder. 
Geographical discovery must be included, therefore, among the 
influences which made the eighteenth century so conspicuously 
an age of enlightenment. 

Studies 

i. Locate these places: Batavia; Cape Colony; Madras; Bombay; Calcutta; 
and Pondicherry. 2. Identify these dates in American colonial history: 1607; 
1620; 1713; 1763; and 1783. 3. According to the mercantile theory, what 
constituted a "favorable" and what an "unfavorable" balance of trade? 4. How 
was the colonial policy based on mercantilism opposed to modern ideas of commer- 
cial freedom? 5. What was meant by the saying that colonies were "like so many 
farms of the mother country"? 6. Why was the joint- stock company a more suc- 
cessful method of fostering colonial trade than the regulated company? 7. Show 
that the seventeenth century belonged commercially to the Dutch, as the sixteenth 




Capt. Cook's Voyages 

" Endeavour," 1768-1771 A.D. 

"Resolution," 1772-1775 A.D. 

"Resolution," 1776 -1780 A.D. 

_J I I 



COLONIAL EMPIRES 
IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTUIi 



Portuguese I 



Spanish! 



Dutch [ 



British!— 1 



140 160 



120 Longitude 1 




t 80' fr..m bo(Jr.-.nwlch«) 



■lu from JO Grv«nwlch 80° 



Progress of Geographical Discovery 345 

century had belonged to the Portuguese and Spaniards. 8. What is meant by 
the statement that the Dutch "founded cities on herring skeletons"? o. Why 
was it possible for European powers to secure dominions in India? 10. State the 
basis of the claims of England, France, Spain, and Holland to territory in North 
America during the seventeenth century. n. "The breaking of Spain's naval 
power is an incident of the first importance in the history of the English colonies." 
Comment on this statement. 12. "The expansion of England in the New World 
and in Asia is the formula which sums up for England the history of the eighteenth 
century." Comment on this statement. 13. Show that as a result of the Seven 
Years' War "the Kingdom of Great Britain became the British Empire." 
14. Show that "no taxation without representation" was a slogan which could 
hardly have arisen in any but an English country. 15. Mention some of the ac- 
cusations against George III as set forth in the Declaration of Independence. 

16. "The Declaration of Independence was the formal announcement of demo- 
cratic ideas that had their tap-root in English soil." Comment on this statement. 

17. How did the American Revolution become a world war? 18. In what sense 
was the American Revolution "a civil war within the British Empire"? 
19. Show that the American Constitution established, not a confederation, but a 
federal state. 20. Trace on the map (between pages 344-345) the three 
voyages of Captain Cook. 



CHAPTER X 
THE OLD REGIME 

87. Reform 

The student will recall the more significant transformations 
of European society which closed the Middle Ages and ushered 
An age of in modern times. The Renaissance of literature, 
reason ar ^ an( j i earnm g j geographical discovery, explo- 

ration, and colonization ; and the Protestant Reformation and 
Catholic Counter Reformation all helped to complete the transi- 
tion from the medieval to the modern world. To these three 
movements we may now add the extraordinary awakening of 
Oie European mind in the seventeenth century and especially 
the eighteenth century. It was an age of reason, an age of 
enlightenment. 

The thinkers of this period pursued knowledge not so much 
for its own sake as for its social usefulness. They felt that the 
The reform- time had come when mankind might well discard 
mg spirit many ideas and customs, once serviceable, perhaps, 

but now outworn. To them the chief obstacle in the way of 
progress was found in human ignorance, prejudice, and un- 
reasoning veneration for the past. Systematic and accurate 
knowledge, they believed, would destroy this attachment to 
"the good old days" and would make it possible to create more 
reasonable and enlightened institutions. In other words, 
thinkers were animated by the reforming spirit. 

Reform was sorely needed.. Absolute monarchies claiming 

to rule by divine right, aristocracies in the possession of privi- 

The Old leges and honors, the masses of the people excluded 

egime from any part in the government and burdened 

with taxes and feudal dues — such were some of the survivals 

346 



The Privileged Classes 347 

of medievalism which formed the Old Regime. 1 The eighteenth 
century abolished it in France : the nineteenth and twentieth 
centuries have done much to abolish it in other European 
countries. Let us examine it more closely. 

88. The Privileged Classes 

Where absolutism prevailed, everything depended upon the 
personal character of the sovereign. A Peter the Great might 
set his country upon the road to civilization ; a The 
Louis XIV, on the contrary, might plunge his monarchy 
people into indescribable misery as the result of needless wars 
and extravagant expenditures. As time went on, it began to 
appear more and more unreasonable that a single person should 
have the power to make the laws, levy the taxes, spend the 
revenues, declare war, and conclude peace according to. his 
own inclination. England in the seventeenth century had 
shown that a divine-right monarchy might be replaced by a 
constitutional monarchy and parliamentary control of legis- 
lation. The reformers wished to secure for France and other 
Continental countries at least an equal measure of political 
liberty. 

Not less insistent was their demand for social equality. 

The feudal system had bequeathed as part of its heritage to 

modern Europe a system of class distinctions which _. _. 

r ; The First 

honeycombed society. The highest place was and Second 

occupied by the clergy and nobility, who con- Estates 
stituted the First and Second Estates, respectively. These 
two privileged classes formed a very small minority of the 
population in any European country. Of twenty-five million 
Frenchmen, for instance, less than half a million were clerics 
or nobles. 

Reverence felt by kings and lords for mother Church had 
dowered her representatives with rich and broad domains. 
In France, Spain, Italy, and those parts of Ger- 
many where Church property had not been con- e c ergy 
fiscated by Protestants, the archbishops, bishops, abbots, and 

1 In French, ancicn regime. 



348 The Old Regime 

cardinals ruled as veritable princes and paid few or no taxes 
to the government. These members of the higher clergy were 
recruited mainly from the noble families and naturally took 
the side of the absolute monarchs. The lower clergy, the 
thousands of parish priests, who came from the common people, 
just as naturally espoused the popular cause. They saw the 
abuses of the existing system and supported the demands for 
its reform. 

By the eighteenth century the old feudal nobility had largely 
disappeared from Europe, except in Germany. A new aristoc- 
The racy arose, consisting of those who had been 

nobility ennobled by the king for various services or who 

had held certain offices which conferred noble rank. The 
nobles, like the higher clergy, were great landed proprietors, 
though without the military obligations which rested on feudal 
lords during the Middle Ages. 

Great Britain is almost the only modern state where the 
nobility still keeps an important place in the national life. 
English There are several reasons for this fact. In the 

nobles fa^ pi acej British nobles are not numerous, in 

consequence of the rule of primogeniture. Only the eldest 
son of a peer inherits his father's title and estate ; the younger 
sons are commoners. Even the eldest son during his father'.? 
lifetime is styled "Lord" simply by courtesy. In the second 
place, the social distinction of the nobility arouses little antago- 
nism, because a peer is not bound to marry into another noble 
family but may take his wife from the ranks of commoners. 
In the third place, the nobility is from time to time enlarged 
through the creation of new peers, very often men who have 
distinguished themselves by their public services as generals or 
statesmen or by their contributions to science, art, or letters. 
This constant supply of new blood has helped to preserve the 
British aristocracy from stagnation and incompetence. Finally, 
nobles in Great Britain are taxed as are other citizens and are 
equally amenable to the laws. 

Veiy different was the situation in eighteenth-century France. 
Here there were as many as one hundred thousand nobles, for 



The Unprivileged Classes 349 

the French did not observe the rule of primogeniture. Their 
"gentle birth" enabled them to monopolize the important offices 
in the government, the army, and the Church. French 
They claimed, and largely secured, exemption from nobles 
taxation. The result was that most of the expense of the 
wars, the magnificent palaces, and gorgeous ceremonial of Louis 
XIV and Louis XV was borne by the middle and lower classes 
of France. The provincial nobles, who lived on their country 
estates, usually took more or less part in local affairs and felt 
an interest in the welfare of the peasantry. But many members 
of the nobility were absentee landlords, leading a fashionable 
existence at the court and dancing attendance on the king. 
Nobles of this type were ornamental rather than useful. Their 
luxury and idleness made them objects of odium in the minds 
of all who wished to renovate society. As one reformer de- 
clared, "Through all the vocabulary of Adam, there is not such 
an animal as a duke or a count." 

89. The Unprivileged Classes 

Such were the two privileged orders, or estates. Beneath 
them came the unprivileged order known as the The Third 
Third Estate in France. It consisted of three Estate 
main divisions. 

The middle class, or bourgeoisie, 1 included all those who 
were not manual laborers. Professional men, such as magis- 
trates, lawyers, physicians, and teachers, together The 
with bankers, manufacturers, wholesale merchants, bour g eoisie 
and shopkeepers, were bourgeois. The British middle class 
enjoyed representation in Parliament and frequently entered 
the nobility. The French bourgeoisie, on the contrary, could 
not hold the positions of greatest honor in the government. 
Though well educated and often wealthy, they were made to 
feel in every way their inferiority to the arrogant nobles. They 
added their voices, therefore, to those who demanded political 
liberty and social equality. 

1 From French bonrt;, "town." 



350 The Old Regime 

The next division of the Third Estate comprised the 
artisans living in the towns and cities. They were not very 
The numerous, except in Great Britain, France, west- 

artisans ern Germany, and northern Italy, where industry 

had reached a much higher development than elsewhere in 
Europe. 

The craft guilds, so characteristic of urban life during the 
Middle Ages, had begun to disappear from eighteenth-century 
Survivals of England, but still maintained their importance 
the guild on the Continent. Each trade had its own guild, 

controlling methods of manufacture, quantity and 
quality of the article produced, wages and hours of labor, and 
number of workmen to be employed. In many places, the 
masters, who owned the shops, machines, or tools, alone be- 
longed to the guilds. Even where journeymen and apprentices 
became members, after paying excessive entrance fees, they were 
not admitted to all the privileges of the craft. This exclusive 
policy of the masters provoked much opposition on the part of 
the poorer workmen 1 and led to a demand for the abolition of 
their monopoly of industry. 

The last and by far the largest division of the Third Es- 
tate was that of the peasants. In Prussia, Austria, Hungary, 
The Poland, Russia, and Spain they were still serfs. 

peasants They might not leave their villages or marry with- 

out their lord's consent ; their children must serve in his family 
for several years at a nominal wage ; and they themselves had 
to work for a number of days each week on their lord's land. 
It is said that this forced labor sometimes took so much of the 
peasant's time that he could only cultivate his own holding by 
moonlight. Conditions were better in Italy and western Ger- 
many, though it was a Hessian prince who sold his subjects to 
Great Britain to fight as mercenaries in the American War of 
Independence. In France, serfdom still existed only in Alsace, 
Lorraine, and Franche-Comte, three provinces which had been 
acquired by Louis XIV and Louis XV. The great majority 

1 The so-called urban proletariat (from Latin proles, "offspring," "progeny" — 
referring to those whose only wealth is in their children). 



The Church 351 

of the French peasants enjoyed complete freedom, and many 

of them owned their own farms. 

But even the free peasants of France carried a heavy burden. 

The king imposed the hated land tax (tattle), assessing a certain 

amount on each village and requiring the money survivals of 

to be paid whether the inhabitants could afford * ne manorial 

svstcm 
it or not. Still more hated was the corvee, or 

forced labor exacted by the government from time to time 

on roads and other public works. The clergy demanded tithes, 

which amounted to perhaps a thirteenth of the produce. The 

nobles levied various feudal dues for the use of oven, mill, 

and wine press, and tolls for the use of roads and bridges. 

The game laws were especially vexatious, because farmers were 

obliged to allow the game of neighboring lords to invade their 

fields and destroy the crops. Slight wonder that the peasants 

also formed a discontented class, anxious for any reforms which 

would better their hard lot. 



90. The Church 

Practically all European peoples in the eighteenth century 
called themselves Christians. The majority of them were 
Catholics. The eastern and western branches Greek 
of Catholic Christianity began to draw apart dur- Cathohcs 
ing the earlier Middle Ages and finally separated in the eleventh 
century. 1 This schism was never afterwards healed. The 
Eastern or Greek Church found its adherents principally among 
the inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula and the Russians. 

The Western or Roman Church held undisputed sway 
throughout the rest of Europe before the Protestant Refor- 
mation in the sixteenth century. 2 Even after Roman 
this religious upheaval, it continued to be the Cathohcs 
state church in Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Austria proper, 
the Austrian Netherlands, Bavaria, Poland, and several of 
the Swiss cantons. Moreover, there were numerous Roman 
Catholics in Bohemia, Hungary, and Ireland. 

1 See page 179. 2 See page 203. 



352 



The Old Regime 



Protestants 



The Reformation made Lutheranism the state church in 
Prussia, Saxony, and the three Scandinavian countries. Angli- 
canism in England, Wales, and Ireland, and 
Presby terianism in Scotland and Holland held a 
similarly privileged position. There were also many Protes- 
tants in France, Switzerland, and southern Germany. 

The divisions among Protestants gave rise to new sects. 
The Unitarians, who rejected the doctrine of the Trinity, 
NewProtes- gained followers in Poland and Hungary as early 
tant sects as ^g sixteenth century and subsequently in the 
British Isles and the United States. Seventeenth-century 

England produced the Baptists, 
whose name was derived from 
their insistence on immersion of 
adults as the only proper form 
of baptism. The Society of 
Friends, or Quakers, as they are 
commonly called, also arose in 
England at this time. Their 
founder was George Fox, a 
weaver's son. The Quakers re- 
jected all religious ceremonial, 
had no paid ministers, and did 
not observe the two sacraments 
of baptism and the Lord's Sup- 
per. War and negro slavery 
were condemned as unchristian 
by the Quakers. 
Methodism took its start in the eighteenth century out of 
the preaching of John Wesley and his associates. They worked 
The among the common people of England and won 

Methodists a i ar g e following by the fervor, piety, and strict- 
ness of their ways. The Methodists finally separated from the 
Anglican Church and became an independent denomination. 
The union of Church and State in both Catholic and Protes- 
tant countries seemed to make conformity to the established 
religion essential for all citizens. Non-conformity was con- 




John Wesley 

After a painting by George Romney in the 
possession of W. R. Cassels, London. 



The Church 



353 



sidered a crime, which the government stood ready to punish 
by fines, imprisonment, and even death. Heretics were burnt at 
the stake in eighteenth-century Spain. In France, Religious 
after Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes intolerance 
(1685), Huguenots who held religious services were sent to the 
galleys. The Toleration Act (1689) in England, while allowing 
the Dissenters to worship publicly in their own way, did not 
extend this privilege to Roman Catholics, Unitarians, and Jews. 
Even where active persecution of nonconformists had ceased, 
the strict press censorship in most countries interfered with 




Boys' Sports 

An illustration in an old English edition (1659) of Comenius's Qrbis Piclus (Illustrated 
World). This was the first picture book ever made for children, and for a century it 
remained the most popular school text in Europe. 

the free expression of thought on religious subjects. Only 
Holland, Switzerland, and Great Britain did not require an 
official license for the publication of books, pamphlets, and news- 
papers. 

The clergy in Catholic lands kept much of the authority 
which they had exercised throughout the Middle Ages. Cases 
involving heresy or blasphemy were tried in their Ecciesias- 
own courts. They alone registered births and tical con trol 
deaths and solemnized legal marriages. Hospitals and chari- 
table institutions remained under their direction. Clergymen 
taught and generally controlled the elementary and higher 
schools. One result of the Reformation was the introduction 



354 The Old Regime 

into some of the German states, Holland, Scotland, and the 
Puritan colonies of New England of schools supported by 
general taxation, so that every one might be able to read and 
interpret the Scriptures. But with such exceptions the public 
school system was almost unknown in Europe. The common 
people were usually uneducated. 

1. Liberal Ideas of Industry and Commerce; the 
Economists 

The abuses of the Old Regime were not greater in the eight- 
eenth century than for hundreds of years before, but now they 
were to be seriously attacked by thinkers who applied the 
test of reasonableness to every institution. It was at this time 
Political that political economy, or economics, came into 

economy, or being. Economic science, which investigates such 
subjects as the production of wealth and its dis- 
tribution as rent, interest, profits, and wages, the functions 
of money and credit, and the methods of taxation, had been 
studied in earlier times by those whose chief motive was to 
increase the riches of merchants and fill the treasuries of kings. 
Students now took a wider view and began to search for the 
true causes of national well-being. 

The economists who flourished in France received the name 
of Physiocrats, 1 because they believed that natural laws ruled 
The in the economic world. In opposition to the 

Physiocrats Mercantilists, who held that the wealth of a 
nation comes from industry and commerce, some of the Physio- 
crats declared that it comes from agriculture. Manufacturers, 
said they, merely give a new form to materials extracted from 
the earth, while traders do nothing more than transfer com- 
modities from one person to another. Fanners are the only 
productive members of society. It was a striking doctrine to 
enunciate at a time when the peasantry formed, as has been 
said, the "beast of burden" of the Old Regime. This group 
of Physiocrats did a real service in insisting upon the importance 

1 A term derived from two Greek words meaning "nature" and "to rule." 



The Scientists 



355 



of agriculture, even though they erred in assuming that it is 
the sole source of wealth. 

Another group of Physiocrats protested against the burden- 
some restraints imposed upon industry by the guilds and upon 
commerce by the governments. They advocated Laissez- 
economic freedom. Any one should be allowed faire 
to make what things he likes ; all occupations should be open to 
everybody ; trade between different parts of the country should 
not be impeded by tolls and taxes ; customs duties should not 
be levied on foreign goods. The Physiocratic teaching was 
summed up in the famous phrase laissez-faire — "let alone." 

A Scotch professor of phi- 
losophy, Adam Smith, who had 
visited France and knew the 
Physiocrats, car- Adam Smith, 
ried their ideas 172 3-1790 
across the Channel. His fa- 
mous work on the Wealth of 
Nations appeared in 1776, the 
year of American independ- 
ence. It formed a new decla- 
ration of independence for in- 
dustry and commerce. Smith 
set forth the doctrine of laissez- 
faire so clearly and persuasively 
as to make a profound impres- 
sion upon business men and 
statesmen. His arguments against monopolies, bounties, and 
protective tariffs did much to secure the subsequent adoption of 
free trade by Great Britain and even affected Continental legis- 
lation. Thus the Wealth of Nations, judged by its results, must 
be accounted one of the most important books ever written. 

92. The Scientists 

Arithmetic, geometry, and algebra (elementary n athemat- 
ics) had been studied in the schools and universities of the 
Middle Ages. It remained to create the higher mathematics, 




Adam Smith 

A medallion by James Tassie. 



356 



The Old Regime 




Astronomy 



including analytic geometry, logarithms, the theory of proba- 
bilities, and the infinitesimal calculus. Knowledge of the cal- 
Mathematics cu l us > which deals with quantities infinitely small, 
has been of immense service in engineering and 
other applied science. Credit for its discovery is divided 
between the German Leibniz (i 646-1 71 6) and his English 
contemporary Sir Isaac Newton (1642-17 2 7). 

The profound mind of Newton formulated the so-called law 
of gravitation. He showed by mathematical calculation that 

the motion of the planets about 
the sun, and of the moon about the 
earth, can be explained as due to the same 
mysterious force of gravity which makes the 
apple fall to the ground. This discovery that 
all the movements of the heavenly bodies obey 
one simple physical law forms perhaps the 
greatest achievement in the history of science. 
Scarcely less important was the nebular hy- 
pothesis of the French astronomer Laplace (1749- 
1827). He conjectured that our own and other 
solar systems had been produced by the conden- 
sati©n of nebulous matter once diffused through 
space; in other words, that the nebulae were 
stages in the formation of stars. The further 
Death Mask achievements of eighteenth-century astronomy 
include the discovery beyond Saturn of a new 
planet, Uranus, the computation of the distance 
between the earth and the moon, and the proof 
that our solar system as a whole is moving 
toward a point in the constellation Hercules. 
Various investigators at this time laid the foundation of 
modern physics, particularly in the departments of electricity 
and magnetism. Benjamin Franklin, by his kite 
experiment, demonstrated that lightning is really 
an electrical phenomenon. The memory of the Italian Volta 
is perpetuated whenever an electrician refers to a "voltaic cell" 
or uses the term "volt." Two Frenchmen, the Montgolfier 



of Sir Isaac 
Newton 

In the possession 
of the Royal Society 
of London. 



Physics 



Liberal Ideas of Religion and Politics 357 

Brothers, invented the balloon, thus beginning the conquest 
of the air. The first successful ascents in balloons took place 
at Paris in 1783. 

Chemical research made rapid progress. Greek philosophers 
had taught that earth, air, water, and fire comprise the original 
"elements" out of which everything else was made. 
The chemists now disproved this idea by decom- emis ry 
posing water into the two gases, hydrogen and oxygen. The 
Frenchman Lavoisier (1 743-1 794) also showed that fire is really 
a union of oxygen with earthy carbon. Until his time it had 
been supposed that objects burn because they contain a com- 
bustible substance known as "phlogiston." We further owe to 
Lavoisier the modern doctrine of the indestructibility of matter. 

Eighteenth-century explorers brought back to Europe from 
America and the Pacific many new species of animals and plants, 
thus greatly encouraging biological study. Here 
the most eminent name is that of the Swede Lin- 10 ogy 
nseus (1 707-1 778), whose careful classification of plants es- 
tablished botany as a science. 

Scientific investigations, in previous times pursued by lonely 
thinkers, now began to be carried on systematically by the 
members of learned societies. Italy led the way Learned 
with the foundation at Naples and Rome of the societies 
first academies of science, and her example was followed at 
Paris, Berlin, and other European capitals. Shortly after the 
"Glorious Revolution" a group of English investigators ob- 
tained a charter forming them into the Royal Society of London. 
It still exists and enrolls the most distinguished scientists of 
Great Britain. Never before had there been so much interest 
in science and so many opportunities to uncover the secrets of 
nature. 

93. Liberal Ideas of Religion and Politics ; the English 
Philosophers 

The advance of science, which immensely broadened men's 
conceptions of the universe, could not fail to affect their atti- 
tude toward religion. The idea of the reign of natural law 



35$ The Old Regime 

in the physical world was now extended to the spiritual world. 
Thinking men began to argue that the doctrines of Christianity 
Rationalism should not be accepted on the authority either of 
in religion the church or of the Bible, but must be submitted 
to free inquiry. These champions of reason — the rationalists 
— especially flourished in Great Britain, where thought was 
less fettered than on the Continent. 

Some of the rationalists, including John Locke, defended 
Christianity as being the most reasonable of all religions. 
John Locke, Nevertheless, in his famous Letters on Tolerance, 
1632-1704 Locke made a plea for individual liberty of con- 
science. To persecute unbelievers, he argued, only transformed 
them into hypocrites. Religious belief is a state of mind, and 
the mind cannot be compelled to believe. If infidels were to 
be converted by force, it would be easier for God to do it "with 
armies of heavenly legions than for any son of the Church, 
how potent soever, with all his dragoons." 

Other rationalists went beyond Locke and questioned the 

special claims of Christianity. They declared that the ques- 

_,, _' tions over which Christian sects had disputed for 

The Deists . * 

centuries were really of minor importance ; the 
essential thing was the doctrine common to all mankind. 
Thus they arrived at the conception of "natural religion," 
which included simply the belief in a personal God and in man's 
immortal soul. These thinkers received the name of Deists. 1 

By casting doubt on the efficacy of particular religions, 
the Deists gave an impetus to the demand for toleration of 
Influence of all. Their speculations found a warm welcome 
the Deists j. n p rance; w here they helped to undermine rever- 
ence for the Church among the more intelligent classes. Deism 
in this way acted as a revolutionary ferment. 

Rationalism also invaded politics. British thinkers, of 
whom Locke in his Two Treatises on Government was again 
Rationalism the mos t prominent representative, developed a 
in politics theory of politics utterly opposed to the old doc- 
trine of the divine right of kings. According to Locke, all 

1 Latin Dens, "God." 



The French Philosophers 359 

men possess certain natural rights to life, liberty, and the owner- 
ship of property. To preserve these rights they have entered 
into a contract with one another, agreeing that the majority 
shall have power to make and execute all necessary laws. If 
the government, thus created, breaks the contract by violating 
man's natural rights, it has no longer any claim to the allegiance 
of its subjects and may be legitimately overthrown. 

To say that all government exists, or should exist, by the 
consent of the governed is to set up the doctrine of popular 
sovereignty. How influential it was may be seen Popular 
from passages in the Declaration of Independence soverei s nt y 
which reproduce the very words of Locke and other British 
writers. But their ideas found the heartiest reception in France. 
Enlightened members of the nobility and bourgeoisie, weary 
of royal despotism, took them up, expounded them, and spread 
them among the people. 

94. The French Philosophers 

France during the eighteenth century had not been able to 
maintain the high position among European states to which 
she had been raised by Louis XIV, and in the intellectual 
struggle for colonial empire she had been defeated leadership 
by Great Britain. Her intellectual leadership com- 
pensated for all that she had lost. Throughout this century 
France gave birth to a succession of philosophers, whose ideas fell 
like fertilizing rain upon the arid soil of the Old Regime. Some 
of them had lived for a time in Great Britain as refugees from 
the persecution which too bold thinking involved at home. 
Their life there made them acquainted with the British system 
of constitutional monarchy — so unlike the absolutism of French 
kings — with the political theories of Locke, and with the ideas 
of the Deists, from whom they learned to submit time-honored 
beliefs to searching examination. 

A nobleman, lawyer, and judge, Montesquieu, spent twenty 
years in composing a single book on the Spirit of Laws. It is 
a classic in political science. There was nothing revolutionary 
in Montesquieu's conclusions. He examined each form of 



360 



The Old Regime 



government in order to determine its excellencies and defects. 
The British constitution seemed to him most admirable, as 
Montesquieu, combining the virtues of monarchy, aristocracy, 
1689-1755 anc j democracy. Montesquieu especially insisted 
upon the necessity of separating the executive, legislative, and 
judicial functions of government, instead of combining them in 
the person of a single ruler. This idea influenced the French 

revolutionists and also had 
great weight with the framers 
of the Constitution of the 
United States. 

The foremost figure among 
the philosophers was Voltaire, 
Voltaire, who sprang from 

1694-1778 ^g bourgeoisie. 
He was not a deep thinker like 
Montesquieu, but was rather a 
brilliant and somewhat super- 
ficial man of letters. For more 
than half a century he poured 
forth a succession of poems, 
dramas, essays, biographies, 
histories, and other works, so clearly written, so witty, and 
so satirical as to win the applause of his contemporaries. 

Voltaire devoted a long life to the preaching of enlighten- 
ment. He was in no sense a revolutionist, and favored reform 
Voltaire and by royal decree as being the simplest and most 
the Church expeditious method. He made it his particular 
work to bring discredit on ecclesiastical authority. The Church 
he regarded as an invention of self-seeking priests. A typical 
Deist, Voltaire insisted on the need of toleration. "Since we 
are all steeped in error and folly," he said, "we must forgive 
each other our follies." His exposure of bigotry and fanaticism 
was needed in the eighteenth century. It has helped to create 
the freer atmosphere in which religious thought moves to-day. 
If Voltaire was the destroyer of the old, Rousseau was the 
prophet of the new. This son of a Geneva watchmaker, who 




Voltaire 

A statue by J. A. Houdon in the Comedie 
Francaise, Paris. 



The French Philosophers 



361 



wandered from one European capital to another, made a failure 
of everything he undertook and died poverty-stricken and 
demented. The discouragements and miseries of Rousseau, 
his career found expression in what he wrote. 1712 1778 
Rousseau felt only contempt for the boasted civilization of 
the age. He loved to picture what he supposed was once the 
"state of nature," before governments had arisen, before the 
strong had begun to oppress the weak, when nobody owned 
the land, and when there were no taxes and no wars. "Back 
to nature" was Rousseau's cry. 
Such fancies Rousseau applied 
to politics in what was his most 
important book, The .« Social 

the Social Contract. Contract," 
Starting with the 
assertion that "man was born 
free and everywhere he is in 
chains," he went on to describe 
a purely ideal state of society 
in which the citizens are ruled 
neither by kings nor parlia- 
ments, but themselves make the 
laws directly. The only way to 
reform the world, according to 
Rousseau, was to restore the 
sovereignty of the people, with 
"Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" 
for all. As we have just learned, the idea that governments 
and laws arise by voluntary agreements among men, who may 
overthrow them when necessary, was not new ; but Rousseau 
first gave it wide currency. Frenchmen of every class read the 
Social Contract with avidity, and during the Revolution they 
proceeded to put its democratic teachings into effect. 

Rousseau, Voltaire, and Montesquieu were among the con- 
tributors to the famous Encyclopedia, a work in seventeen 
volumes, which appeared after the middle of the eighteenth 
century. As the name indicates, it formed a repository of 




Rousseau 

A portrait by Ramsay made in 1766. 



362 The Old Regime 

all the scientific and historical knowledge of the age. The En- 
cyclopedists, as its editors are known, sought to guide opinion, 
The En- as well as to give information. They were radical 

cyclopedists thinkers, who combined in a great effort to throw 
the light of reason on the dark places of the social order. Among 
the abuses attacked by them were religious intolerance, the 
slave trade, the cruel criminal law, and the inequitable system 
of taxation. The Encyclopedists even ventured to criticize 
absolutism in government. Their work thus set in motion a 
current of revolt which did much to undermine both Church 
and State in France. 

95. The Enlightened Despots 

The ideas of the philosophers spread throughout those parts 

of Europe where French models were followed. Even kings 

and statesmen began to be affected by the spirit 
Paternalism ° . 

of reform. European rulers did not intend to 

surrender the least fraction of absolute power; they were still 
autocrats who believed in government by one strong man 
rather than by the democratic many ; but with their despotism 
they combined a paternal solicitude for the welfare of their 
subjects. They took measures to secure religious toleration, 
to relieve poverty, to codify the laws, to provide elementary 
education, and to encourage scientific research. These activi- 
ties have won for them the name of the "enlightened despots." 
In Russia Catherine the Great posed as an enlightened despot. 
Catherine was a learned woman, at least for an empress. She 
Catherine wrote flattering letters to Voltaire and the other 
the Great Encyclopedists and conferred on them gifts and 
pensions. Montesquieu she especially admired, saying that 
were she the pope she would canonize him. But Catherine 
paid little more than lip-service to the ideas of the French phi- 
losophers. If she abolished torture, she did not do away with 
the knout; for capital punishment she only substituted the 
living death of exile in Siberia. Her toleration of dissenters 
from the Orthodox Church stopped short of allowing them to 
build chapels for public worship, and her passion for legislative 



The Enlightened Despots 363 

reform grew cold when she found that she must begin by freeing 
the serfs. Catherine's real attitude is exhibited in a letter to 
the governor of Moscow: "My dear prince, do not complain 
that the Russians have no desire for instruction ; if I institute 
schools it is not for us, it is for Europe, where we must keep our 
position in public opinion. But the clay when our peasants shall 
wish to become educated both you and I will lose our places." 

Catherine's contemporary, Frederick the Great, was a des- 
pot more sincere and more enlightened. He worked harder 
and had fewer pleasures than any other king of his Frederick 
day. "Monarchs," he once wrote, "are not in- the Great 
vested with authority that they may riot in voluptuousness." 
Although Frederick's resources had been so completely drained 
by the Seven Years' War that it was necessary for him to melt 
the silver in the royal palaces and debase the currency, his 
vigorous measures soon restored the national prosperity. He 
labored in a hundred ways to make Prussia the best-governed 
state in Europe. Thus, he founded elementary schools so that 
his subjects could learn at least to read and write, and reformed 
the courts so that everybody from high to low might be assured 
of impartial justice. A Deist in religion, the correspondent 
and friend of Voltaire, Frederick declared that every one should 
be allowed to get to heaven in his own way, and backed up his 
declaration by putting Roman Catholics on an equality with 
Protestants throughout the Prussian dominions. No less than 
thirty volumes, all in French, contain the poems, letters, and 
treatises on history, politics, and military matters which Fred- 
erick managed to compose in the spare moments of a busy life. 
This philosopher on the throne held the attention of his genera- 
tion in the world of ideas as well as in that of diplomacy and war. 

In Austria, Joseph II, 1 the eldest son of Maria Theresa, pre- 
sented a less successful type of the enlightened despot. Joseph 
regarded Frederick the Great as the ideal of a 
modern ruler. He wished to transform the various 
peoples in the Hapsburg realm, with all their differences of race, 

1 Holy Roman Emperor, 1765-1700, and sole ruler of the Hapsburg realm, 1780- 
1790. 



3 6 4 



The Old Regime 



speech, religion, and aspirations, into a single unified nation. 
German officials sent out from Vienna were to administer the 
affairs of each province. The army was to be built up by com- 
pulsory service after the Prussian model. German was to be 
used everywhere as the official language. Most unwisely, 
however, Joseph tried to do in a short lifetime what all the 
Hapsburg rulers after him could not accomplish. The result 
was that his measures to Germanize Hungarians, Bohemians, 
Italians, and Netherlanders only aroused hostility and did not. 

survive his death. The sen- 
tence that the king himself 
proposed as his epitaph was 
a truthful summary of his 
reign: "Here lies the man 
who, with the best inten- 
tions, never succeeded in 
anything." 

Paternal government had 
two serious weaknesses. 
First, the despots could not 
determine the policy of 

Failure of their succes- 
paternalism sors> An able 




Joseph II 

After a painting by A. von Maron. 



and liberal-minded ruler 
might be followed by a ruler 
who was indolent, extrava- 
gant, and unprogressive. In Prussia, for instance, the weak 
reign of Frederick the Great's successor undid much of his work. 
The same thing happened in Spain and Portugal. Second, 
the despots, however enlightened, treated their subjects as 
children and enacted reforms without first discovering whether 
reformation was popularly desired. Because of these weak- 
nesses, the eighteenth-century conception of absolute monarchs 
ruling for their people's good was certain to be superseded by 
the modern idea of the people ruling themselves. But to 
bring this about, a revolution was necessary. 



The Enlightened Despots 365 

Studies 

1. Do monarchy and autocracy necessarily mean the same thing? 2. What 
was the origin of the names Quaker and Methodist? 3. Contrast the leading 
ideas of Mercantilism and Physiocracy. 4. What do you understand by laws of 
nature? Give some examples of such laws. 5. Mention some instances of the 
international character of science in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 
6. Distinguish between deism (or theism) and atheism. 7. How did Locke's 
theory of the social contract provide the intellectual justification for the "Glorious 
Revolution"? 8. Is there any reason to suppose that Rousseau's "state of nature" 
ever existed anywhere? o. Why has Rousseau's Social Contract been called "the 
Bible of the French Revolution" and "the gospel of modern democracy"? 10. 
Show that Rousseau's ideas of government were far more radical than the ideas of 
Montesquieu. n. Why did not the reforms of the enlightened despots make a 
revolution unnecessary? 12. "No reform can produce real good unless it is the 
work of public opinion, and unless the people themselves take the initiative." Dis- 
cuss the justice of this statement. 13. Describe those features of the Old Regime 
which led to the demand for "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity." 14. "The evils 
of European society were rooted in feudalism and entrenched in privilege." Com- 
ment on this statement. 15. How do the facts presented in this chapter support 
the statement that "Great thinkers control the affairs of men, and by their discov- 
eries regulate the march of nations" ? 



CHAPTER XI 

THE REVOLUTIONARY AND NAPOLEONIC ERA, 
1789-1815 i 

96. Eve of the French Revolution 

What we call the French Revolution refers to a series of 
events in France, between 1789 and 1799, ^Y which divine- 
Revoiu- right monarchy gave way to a republic, and class 

tionary distinctions and privileges disappeared in favor 

of social equality. This revolution started in 
France, not because the misery of the people had become more 
intolerable there than in other parts of the Continent, but 
because France was then the most advanced of Continental 
countries. French peasants and artisans were free enough and 
intelligent enough to be critical of their government. Next to 
Great Britain, France contained the most numerous, prosper- 
ous, and influential bourgeoisie. Members of this class furnished 
the Revolution with its principal leaders. Even the nobility 
and clergy included many men who realized the abuses of the 
Old Regime and wished to abolish them. In short, the revo- 
lutionary impulse stirred all ranks of French society. 

That impulse came in part from across the Channel. The 
spectacle of the Puritan Revolution and the "Glorious Revo- 
England lution" in the seventeenth century affected 
and the Frenchmen in the eighteenth century. The Eng- 
lish had put one king to death and had expelled 
another; they had established the supremacy of Parliament 
in the state. It was the example of parliamentary England 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter xxx, "France 
on the Eve of the Revolution"; chapter xxxi, "Scenes of the 'French Revolu- 
tion"; chapter xxxii, "Letters and Proclamations of Napoleon"; chapter xxxiii, 
"Napoleon." Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 16, "Decree Abolishing the 
Feudal System, 1789"; No. 17, "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the 
Citizen, 1789"; No. 18, "Address to All Peoples, 1792." 

366 



Eve of the French Revolution 367 

which Montesquieu held up to the emulation of his country- 
men. It was the political philosophy of the Englishman, 
John Locke, upon which Rousseau founded his doctrine of the 
sovereignty of the people. 

A second impulse came from across the Atlantic. After 
the close of the War of American Independence, the French 
common soldiers, together with Lafayette and America 
other officers, returned home to spread republican and the 
doctrines. Very important was the work of Ben- 
jamin Franklin, who for nearly a decade represented the Ameri- 
can government at Paris. His engaging manners, practical 
wisdom, and high principles won general admiration. The 
portrait of the Philadelphia printer hung in every house, and 
at republican festivals his bust figured side by side with that 
of Rousseau. "Homage to Franklin," cried an enthusiastic 
Frenchman, "he gave us our first lessons in liberty." 

To understand the outbreak of the French Revolution it is 
necessary to go back to the long reign of Louis XV. 1 France 
had never had so unkingly a sovereign as this Louis xv 
successor of the "Grand Monarch." All his life king, 
he was an idler. He hunted, he danced, he 
gambled, he sank deep in the frivolities and immoralities of 
Versailles, he did everything but rule. The government fell 
more and more into the hands of courtiers and adventurers, 
whose main concern was to line their own pockets at the expense 
of the public treasury. 

The foolish alliances and fatal wars upon which Louis XV 
was persuaded to enter reduced France to the position of a 
second-rate power. In the Seven Years' War Decline of 
French armies were repeatedly vanquished on France 
Continental battle-fields, and French fleets were swept from the 
high seas. When the Peace of Paris was signed in 1763, the 
French flag ceased to fly in North America, and it flew in India 
only by permission of England. The annexation of Lorraine 
and Corsica did not compensate for the loss of a colonial empire. 2 

1 Great-grandson of Louis XIV. See page 302, note 1. 

2 See the map on page 298. 



368 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 



The military failures of the king's reign humiliated his subjects 
and undermined their loyalty to him. 

The wars and extravagance of Louis XV added to the legacy 
of debt with which his predecessor on the throne had saddled 
Financial France. The treasury every year faced a chronic 
distress deficit. It could only be met by the dangerous 

expedient of fresh loans, involving still larger outlays for in- 
terest charges. As 
long as the govern- 
ment refused to take 
proper measures of 
economy and con- 
tinued to exempt the 
clergy and nobility 
from their share of 
taxation, little im- 
provement of the 
financial situation 
was possible. France, 
the richest country 
in Europe, with a 
population greater 
than that of any 
rival state, became 
virtually bankrupt. 

The French mon- 
archy, so despised 
abroad, 
had to 
face a 
growing volume of 
complaints at home. Louis XV did his best to stifle them. A 
rigid censorship muzzled the press. Postoffice officials opened 
letters passing through the mails and revealed their con- 
tents to the king. Books and pamphlets, obnoxious to the 
government, were burned by the common hangman, and their 
authors were imprisoned. No man's personal liberty was safe, 




Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and the 
Dauphin 

After a painting by P. Sauvage. 



Complaints 
against the 
monarchy 



Eve of the French Revolution 



309 



for the police, if provided with an order of arrest signed by the 
king (a lettre de cachet), could send any one to jail. Suspected 
persons sometimes remained prisoners for years without trial. 
Yet in spite of all measures of repression, opposition to the 
monarchy steadily increased. 

Louis XVI, the grandson of Louis XV, mounted the throne 
when only twenty years old. Virtuous, pious, and well-meaning, 
he was the sort of ruler who in quiet times might Louis XVI> 
have won the esteem of the French people. He ^ in s, 1774- 

1792 

was, however, weak, indolent, slow of thought, 

and very slow of decision. It has been well said that Louis XVI 

"could love, forgive, suffer, 

and die," but that he did 

not know how to reign. 

The youthful king began 
his reign auspiciously by ap- 
pointing a new 
ministry, in 
which Turgot 
held the most 
responsible position. He 
was a friend of Voltaire, a 
contributor to the Encyclo- 
pedia, an economist of the 
Physiocratic school, and 
a successful administrator. 
Turgot summed up his finan- 
cial policy in the three maxims, "No bankruptcy, no increase of 
taxation, no loans." Expenses were to be reduced by cutting off 
the pensions to courtiers, whose only merit was, in the words of 
a contemporary writer, "to have taken the trouble to be born." 
The taxes bearing most heavily on the Third Estate were to be 
replaced by a general tax on all landowners. Peasants were to 
be no longer forced to work without pay on public highways 
and bridges. The old guilds, which hampered industry, were 
to be abolished. The vexatious tolls and duties on the passage 
of grain from one province to another were to be swept away. 



Turgot's 
ministry 
of reform, 
1774-1776 




Turgot 

A medal in joint honor of Turgot and Adam 
Smith, struck by the Societe d'Economie Poli- 
tique in 1876. 



370 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

Could such reforms have been carried out, France would have 
had a bloodless and orderly revolution. 

But they were not carried out. The privileged classes would 
not surrender their privileges, nor favorites their pensions, nor 
Dismissal monopolists their unjust gains, without a struggle. 
of Turgot 'pjjg wea k king, who once declared that "the only 
persons who truly love the people are Monsieur Turgot and 
myself," failed to support him against the intrigues of the court 
party, led by his own wife, Marie Antoinette. 1 Turgot's dis- 
missal from office after two years of power removed the one 
man who could have saved absolutism in France. 

The finances of the government went from bad to worse 
after the fall of Turgot. His successors in the ministry relied 
Financial mainly on fresh loans to cover the deficits of the 

chaos treasury and avert bankruptcy. From the stand- 

point of French interests, Louis XVI committed a fatal error 
in allowing himself to be persuaded to intervene in the War 
of American Independence. America was freed ; Great Britain 
was humbled ; but the war forced up the public debt of France 
by leaps and bounds. When at last it became impossible to 
borrow more money, the king yielded reluctantly to the popular 
demand for the convocation of the Estates-General. He ap- 
pealed to the nation for aid, thereby confessing the failure of 
absolutism. 

97. The Estates-General, 1789 

The Estates-General, the old feudal assembly of France, had 
not met for one hundred and seventy-five years. Suddenly 
Th awakened from their long slumber, the repre- 

General sentatives of the clergy, the nobles, and the Third 

convenes Estate appeared at Versailles to take counsel 

May 5, 1739 1 r 

with the king. The written instructions drawn 

up in every part of the country for the guidance of each repre- 
sentative, though not revolutionary in wording, set forth a 
long list of abuses to be removed. While Louis XVI would 
have been satisfied with measures to increase the revenues, 
most Frenchmen wanted thoroughgoing reforms. 
1 A daughter of Maria Theresa. 



The Estates-General, 1789 



37i 



Not quite half of the twelve hundred-odd members of the 
Estates-General belonged to the two privileged orders. About 
two-thirds of the delegates of the Third Estate 
were members of the legal profession. A few of the 
were liberal nobles. 
the lower classes, 
represented the most prosperous and intelligent people of France. 



Less than a dozen came from Estates- 
General 
As a whole, the Estates-General 




Costumes of the Orders 

After an old print. The cleric wears a robe and ornamented mantle; the noble, a suit of 
black silk and a cap adorned with plumes; the representative of the Third Estate, a simple 
black suit without gold buttons or plumed cap. 

The Third Estate possessed two very competent leaders in 
Count Mirabeau and the Abbe Sieves. The former belonged 
by birth and the latter by ofhee to the privileged Mirabeau 
classes, but both gladly accepted election as repre- and Sie y es 
sentatives of the Third Estate. Mirabeau, a born statesman 
and orator, had a sincere belief in constitutional government. 
He wished to set up in France a strong monarchy, limited by a 
constitution after the English model. Sieyes, a cleric more 
devoted to politics than to theology, had recently stirred all 
Frenchmen by a remarkable pamphlet entitled 11 'hat is tin- 
Third Estate? He answered, "Everything." "What has it" 
been hitherto?" "Nothing." "What does it ask?" "To be 
something." 



372 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 



Organization 
of the 
Estates- 
General 



The three estates in former days sat as separate chambers 
and voted by orders. If this usage were now followed, the 
clergy and the nobility would have two votes to 
one for the Third Estate. The commoners in- 
sisted, however, that the new Estates-General 
no longer represented feudal France, but the 
united nation. They wished, therefore, that it should organize 
as a single body, in which the members voted as individuals. 
Since the Third Estate had been permitted to send twice as 

many delegates as either 
the clergy or the no- 
bility, this arrangement 
would enable it to out- 
vote the privileged 
orders and carry any 
reforming measures de- 
sired. 

The debate over the 
organization of the 
Estates-General con- 
tinued for several weeks 
and resulted in a dead- 
The National lock. At 

Assembly last, on the 

declared, 

June 17, motion of 

1789 Sieyes, the 

Third Estate cut the 

Gordian knot by boldly declaring itself the National Assembly. 

Then and there it asserted its right to act for the nation as a 

whole. Representatives of the clergy and nobility might come in if 

they pleased, but the National Assembly could do without them. 

Louis XVI, left to himself, might have been too inert for 

resistance, but his wife, his two brothers, and the court party 

" Tennis- persuaded him to make a stand. Troops were 

Court Oath," now posted before the doors of the hall which had 

been set apart in the palace of Versailles for the 

Third Estate. Finding their entrance barred, the undaunted 




MlRABEAU 

After a miniature (1791) by J. Lemoine in the 
possession of M. F. Flameng. 



Outbreak of the French Revolution 373 

commoners adjourned to a building near by, which had been 
used as a tennis court. Here they took a solemn oath never 
to separate, but to continue to meet, under all circumstances, 
until they had drawn up a constitution for France. This 
action brought to their side the representatives of the lower 
clergy {cures), who were inclined to the popular cause. 

But the king persisted in his opposition. Summoning the 
three estates before him, he made known the royal will that 
they should deliberate apart. The higher clergy The National 
and nobility immediately withdrew to their sepa- f e s c s e ™j > z 1 J di 
rate chambers. The Third Estate, with its clerical June 27, 
supporters, did not stir. When the master of 1789 
ceremonies repeated the king's command, Mirabeau retorted, 
"We are assembled by the national will; force alone shall 
disperse us." Louis XVI did not dare to use force, especially 
after many of the nobles, headed by Lafayette, joined the 
commoners. The king now gave way and requested the rest 
of the clerical and noble representatives to unite with the 
Third Estate in the National Assembly. 

98. Outbreak of the French Revolution 
Thus far we have been following a constitutional movement 
confined to the upper and middle classes of French society. 
Now, however, the lower classes began to make Revolu- 
their influence felt upon the course of events, first tlonaf y Pans 
in Paris, and later in the provinces. Paris was a manufacturing 
center, with a large population of artisans, very poor, often 
idle, and inclined to be turbulent. Their ranks were swelled 
at this time by crowds of peasants, whom the bad harvests and 
severe winter of the preceding year had driven into the city. 
Here, in fact, were all the elements of a dangerous mob, on 
whose ignorance and passion reformers, agitators, and dema- 
gogues could play what tunes they willed. 

Soon came ominous news. Louis XVI had hardly accepted 
the National Assembly before he changed his mind and de- 
termined to dissolve that body. A large number of troops, 
mainly German and Swiss regiments in the service of France, 



374 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

were massed near Paris, obviously with intent of awing, per- 
haps seizing, the representatives of the people. It was then 

r. 11 t xu that the Parisians made the cause of the National 
Fall of the 

Bastille, Assembly their own. Rioting broke out in the 

1789 14 capital, and for several days anarchy prevailed. 

Reinforced by deserters from the army, the mob 

attacked and captured the Bastille, a fortress where political 




The Storming of the Bastille 

A picture by a contemporary artist. Lafayette sent the key of the Bastille to Washington 
at Mount Vernon, with these words : "It is a tribute which I owe as a son to my adopted 
father, as an aide-de-camp to my general, as a missionary of liberty to its patriarch." 



offenders had been often confined through lettres de cachet. 
The Bastille at this time contained only seven prisoners, all 
there for just cause, but it symbolized the tyranny of the Old 
Regime, and its fall created an immense sensation throughout 



Outbreak of the French Revolution 375 

France and in other countries. Louis XVI, on hearing the news, 
exclaimed, "Why, this is a revolt!" "No, Sire," replied a 
courtier, "this is a revolution." 

Now that Paris was practically independent of royal control, 
the more prominent and well-to-do citizens took steps to secure 
an orderly government. They formed a munici- 
pal council, or Commune, made up of representa- mune and 

tives elected from the different wards of the citv. *? e National 

J Guard m 

A militia force, called the National Guard, was 

also organized, and the popular Lafayette was selected as com- 
mander. Meanwhile, Louis XVI had seen the necessity of 
submission. He withdrew the troops, got rid of his reactionary 
ministers, and paid a visit of reconciliation to the Parisians. 
In token of his good intentions, the king put on a red, white, 
and blue cockade, red and blue being the colors of Paris and white 
that of the Bourbons. This was to be the new tricolor of France. 

The example set by Pans was quickly copied by the provinces. 
Many cities and towns set up communes and formed national 
guards. In the country districts the peasants Revolution 
sacked and burned numerous castles of the nobility, in the 
taking particular pains to destroy the legal docu- 
ments by which the nobles exercised their manorial rights. 
Monasteries, also, were often pillaged. The government showed 
itself unable to maintain order or to protect life and property. 
Troops in the garrison towns refused to obey their officers 
and fraternized with the populace. Royal officials quitted 
their posts. Courts of justice ceased to act. Public works 
stopped, and the collection of taxes became almost impos- 
sible. From end to end of France the Old Regime collapsed 
amid universal confusion. 

The revolution in the provinces led directly to one of the 
most striking scenes of French history. On the night of Au- 
gust 4-5, while the National Assembly had under The night of 
consideration measures for stilling the unrest in August 4-5, 

. 1789 

France, one of the nobles — a relative of Lafayette 

— urged that it remove the feudal burdens still resting on the 

peasantry. Then, amid hysterical enthusiasm, noble after 



376 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

noble and cleric after cleric arose in his place to propose equality 
of taxation, the repeal of the game laws, the freeing of such serfs 
as were still to be found in France, the abolition of tithes, tolls, 
and pensions, and the extinction of all other long-established 
privileges. A decree "abolishing the feudal system" was 
passed by the National Assembly within the next few days and 
was signed by the king. The reforms which Turgot labored in 




The Destruction of Feudalism 

A contemporary cartoon representing the French people hammering to pieces with their 
flails all the emblems of the feudal system, including the knight's armor and sword and the 
bishop's crosier and miter. 

vain to secure thus became accomplished facts. It is well to 
remember, however, that the Old Regime had already fallen 
in France ; the decree of the National Assembly did little more 
than outlaw it. 



99. The National Assembly, 1789-1791 

The National Assembly remained in session for the next two 
years. One of its most important undertakings was the reform 
The departe- of local government. During the eight centuries 
ments between Hugh Capet and Louis XVI, France had 

been built up by the gradual welding together of a number of 



The National Assembly 



377 



provinces varying greatly in size, and each with its own privi- 
leges, customs, and laws. Eighteenth-century France, in con- 
sequence, did not form a compact, well-organized state. The 
old provinces were now replaced by eighty-three artificial dis- 
tricts (departcments), approximately uniform in size and popu- 
lation and named after some river, mountain, or other natural 
feature. A map of contemporary France still shows the de- 
partcments. 

The National Assembly next undertook a reorganization 
of the Church. It ordered that all Church lands should be 
declared national property, broken up into small Ecciesias- 
lots, and sold to the peasants at a low price, tical 
By way of partial indemnity, the government 
agreed to pay fixed salaries to the clergy. All appointments 
to ecclesiastical positions were taken from the hands of king 



legislation 




■H9|ifflP M 

Domaincsmationawx. 
AssLgnat 

derdioc/lWres , 

payaHej^ao-rporteur. 



Serle 



6329 me 



§|g|§§||l GU iJaagjgssrs^l E3 IIKSM 



An Assignat 



and pope and placed in the hands of the people. The National 
Assembly also suppressed the monasteries, but undertook to 
pension the monks and nuns. 

The desperate condition of the finances led to the adoption 
of a desperate remedy. The National Assembly passed a 
decree authorizing the issue of notes to the value The 
of four hundred million francs on the security of assi g nats 
the former Church lands. To emphasize this security the title 
of assignats was given to the notes. If the issue of assignats 
could have been restricted, as Mirabeau desired, to less than 



378 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

the value of the property pledged to pay for them, they might 
have been a safe means of raising a revenue ; but the continued 
needs of the treasury led to their multiplication in enormous 
quantities. Then followed the inevitable consequences of 
paper money inflation. Gold and silver disappeared from 
circulation, while prices rose so high that the time came when 
it needed a basket of assignats to buy a pair of boots. The 
as signals in the end became practically worthless. The finances 
of the government, instead of being bettered by this resort to 
paper money, were left in a worse state than before. 

The National Assembly gave to France in 179 1 the written 
constitution which had been promised in the "Tennis-Court 
The Con- Oath." The constitution established a legis- 
stitution of lative assembly of a single chamber, with wide 
powers over every branch of the government. 
The hereditary monarchy was retained, but it was a monarchy 
in little more than name. The king could not dissolve the 
legislature, and he had only a "suspensive veto" of its measures. 
A bill passed by three successive legislatures became a law 
even without his consent. Mirabeau wished to accord the 
king greater authority, but the National Assembly distrusted 
Louis XVI as a possible traitor to the Revolution and took every 
precaution to render him harmless. The distrust which the 
bourgeois framers of the constitution felt toward the lower 
classes was shown by the clause limiting the privilege of voting 
to those who paid taxes equivalent to at least three days' 
wages. Almost a half of the citizens, some of them peasants but 
most of them artisans, were thus excluded from the franchise. 

The National Assembly prefixed to the constitution a Decla- 
ration of the Rights of Man. This memorable document, which 

^ . .. shows Rousseau's influence in almost every line, 
Declaration J . 

of the formed a comprehensive statement of the pnn- 

Rightsof ciples underlying the Revolution. All persons, 
so ran the Declaration, shall be equally eligible 
to all dignities, public positions, and occupations, according to 
their abilities. No person shall be arrested or imprisoned ex- 
cept according to law. Any one accused of wrongdoing shall 



The First French Republic 379 

be presumed innocent until he is adjudged guilty. Every 
citizen may freely speak, write, and print his opinions, including 
his religious views, subject only to responsibility for the abuse 
of this freedom. All the citizens have the right to decide what 
taxes shall be paid and how they are to be used. No one shall 
be deprived of his property, except for public purposes, and 
then only after indemnification. These clauses of the Declara- 
tion reappeared in the constitutions framed in France and other 
Continental countries during the nineteenth century. The 
document, as a whole, should be compared with the English 
Bill of Rights and the first ten amendments to the American 
Constitution. 

100. The First French Republic, 1792 

The first phase of the French Revolution was now ended. 
Up to this point it has appeared rather as a reformation, which 
abolished the Old Regime and substituted a limited phases of 
monarchy for absolutism and divine right. Many the Revoiu- 
men believed that under the new constitution 
France would henceforth enjoy the blessings of peace and 
prosperity. They were quickly undeceived. The French 
people, unfortunately, lacked all training in the difficult art 
of self-government. Between their political incapacity and 
the opposition of the reactionaries and the radicals, the revo- 
lutionary movement drifted into its second and more violent 
phase, which was marked by the establishment of a republic. 

The reactionaries consisted, in part, of nobles who had 
hastily quitted the country upon the outbreak of the Revo- 
lution. Their emigration continued for several The 
years, until thousands of voluntary exiles (emi- 6mi s r es 
grcs) had gathered along the northern and eastern frontier of 
France. Headed by the king's two brothers, the count of 
Provence ' and the count of Artois, 2 they kept up an unceasing 
intrigue against the Revolution and even organized a little army 
to recover by force their titles, privileges, and property. 

1 Afterwards Louis XVIII (1814-1824). 

2 Afterwards Charles X (1824-18.50). 



380 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

• Had the reactionaries included only the emigres beyond 
the borders, they might not have proved very troublesome. 
The non- But they found support in France. The Consti- 
junng clergy tution of 1791 had made the clergy state officials, 
elected by the people and paid by the government. Such an 
arrangement could not be acceptable to sincere Roman Catho- 
lics, because it separated the Church from papal control. The 
pope, who had already protested against the confiscation of 
Church property and the dissolution of the monasteries, forbade 
the clergy to take the oath of fidelity to the new constitution. 
Nearly all the bishops and perhaps two-thirds of the cures 
obeyed him ; these were called the non-juring clergy. Until 
this time the parish priests had generally supported the revo- 
lutionary movement. They now turned against it, carrying 
with them their peasant flocks. The Roman Catholic Church, 
with all its spiritual influence, was henceforth arrayed against 
the French Revolution. 

To Louis XVI, the new order of things was most distasteful. 
The constitution, soon to be put into effect, seemed to him a 

_ . . violation of his rights as a monarch, while the 

Opposition ° . 

of Louis XVI treatment of the clergy deeply offended him as a 

and Marie Christian. As long as Mirabeau lived, that- states- 
Antoinette ° Till- 

man had always been able to dissuade the king 

from seeking foreign help, but Mirabeau's premature death 

deprived him of his only wise adviser. Louis's opposition to 

the revolutionists was strengthened by Marie Antoinette, who 

keenly felt the degradation of her position. 

The king and queen finally resolved to escape by flight. 

Disguising themselves, Marie Antoinette as a Russian lady 

„,. , , , and Louis as her valet, they drove away in the 

Flight of the ' J / 

king and evening from the palace of the Tuileries a and 

2« e «?' /^ e made straight for the eastern frontier. But Louis 
20-21, 1791 . 6 

exposed himself needlessly on the way; recogni- 
tion followed ; and at Varennes excited crowds stopped the royal 
fugitives and turned them back to Paris. This ill-starred 
adventure greatly weakened the loyalty of the French people 

1 See the illustration, page 443. 



The First French Republic 381 

for Louis XVI, while Marie Antoinette, the "Austrian woman," 

became more detested than ever. 

Besides the reactionaries who opposed the Revolution, there 

were the radicals who thought that it had not gone far enough. 

The radicals secured their chief following among „,, .. , 
. b 6 The ra dicals 

the poverty-stricken workingmen of the cities, 
those without property and with no steady employment. Of 
all classes in France, the urban proletariat seemed to have 
gained the least by the Revolution. No chance of future 
betterment lay before them, for the bourgeois Constitution of 
1 79 1 expressly provided that only tax-payers could vote or hold 
public office. The proletariat might well believe that, in 
spite of all high-sounding phrases about the "rights of man," 
they had merely exchanged one set of masters for another, the 
rule of the privileged classes for that of the bourgeoisie. 

The radical movement naturally centered in Paris, the brain 
and nerve center of France. It was fostered by inflammatory 
newspapers, which agitated for a popular up- Radical 
rising against the government, by the bitter P r °P a g anda 
speeches of popular orators, and especially by numerous 
political clubs. The control of these clubs lay largely in the 
hands of young lawyers, who embraced the cause of the masses 
and soon became as hostile to the bourgeoisie as to the aristoc- 
racy. The famous Jacobin Club, so named from a former 
monastery of the Jacobin monks where its meetings were held, 
had hundreds of branches throughout France, all engaged in 
radical propaganda. 

The leaders of the Jacobin Club included two men who were 
destined to influence profoundly the subsequent course of the 
Revolution. One was Danton, who sprang from Danton and 
the middle class. Highly cultivated, a successful Robes P ierre 
advocate at the bar, Danton with his loud voice and forcible 
gestures could arouse his audience to wild enthusiasm. The 
other was Robespierre, also a middle-class lawyer with demo- 
cratic sympathies. This austere, precise little man, whose 
youth had been passed in poverty, early became a disciple 
of Rousseau and the oracle of the Jacobins. Mirabeau once 



382 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 



War with 
Austria and 
Prussia, 
April, 1792 



prophesied of Robespierre that he would "go far; he believes 
all that he says." We shall soon see how far he went. 

A new influence began at this point to affect the course 
of the French Revolution. Continental monarchs, however 
"enlightened," felt no sympathy for a popular 
movement which threatened the stability of 
their own thrones. If absolutism and divine 
right were overthrown in France, they might before 
long be overthrown in Austria and Prussia. The Austrian 
monarch, a brother of Marie Antoinette, now joined with the 
Prussian king in a statement to the effect that the restoration of 
the old government in France formed 
an object of "common interest to all 
sovereigns of Europe . ' ' The two rulers 
also agreed to prepare their armies 
for active service abroad. Their an- 
nounced intention to suppress the 
Revolution by force provoked the 
French people into a declaration of 
war. Though directed only at the 
Austrian monarch, it also brought his 
Prussian ally into the field against 
France. 

The French began the contest 
with immense enthusiasm. They re- 
The uprising garded themselves as 
of August armed apostles to spread 
the gospel of freedom 
throughout Europe. But their troops, 
poorly organized and disciplined, suffered severe reverses, one 
result of which was further to exasperate public opinion against 
the monarchy. Suspicion pointed to Louis XVI and Marie 
Antoinette as the traitors who were secretly revealing the French 
plan of campaign to the enemies of France. Suspicion passed 
into hatred, when the allied commander-in-chief, as he led his 
army across the frontier, issued a proclamation threatening Paris 
with destruction if the slightest harm befell the royal family. At 




Robespierre 

A reputed portrait by J. B. 
Greuze, in the possession of Lord 
Rosebery. 



The First French Republic 



383 



this juncture the Jacobins under Danton organized an uprising 
of the Parisian proletariat. The mob stormed the Tuileries, 
massacred the Swiss Guard, and compelled the National As- 
sembly to suspend the king from office. A new assembly, 
to be called the National Convention, was summoned to pre- 
pare another constitution for France. 




The Lion of Lucerne 

This celebrated work at Lucerne in Switzerland was designed by the Danish sculptor 
Bertel Thorwaldsen and was dedicated in 1821. It represents a dying lion, which, pierced 
by a lance, still guards with its paw the Bourbon lilies. The figure is hewn out of the natural 
sandstone. The monument commemorates the officers and men of the Swiss Guard who were 
slain in 1792, while defending the Tuileries against the Parisian mob. 



Then followed the next scene in the bloody drama. The 

Commune of Paris, now controlled by the Jacobins, emptied 

the prisons of persons suspected of royalist lean- Proclamation 

ings and butchered them without mercv. "We of th * 

J , republic. 

must stop the enemy, " said Danton, " by striking September 
terror into the royalists." More than one thou- 22 1792 
sand men, women, and children perished in the "September 
massacres." Shortly afterwards the National Convention held 
its first meetings and by a unanimous vote decreed the abolition 
of the monarchy. All public documents were henceforth to be 
dated from September 22, 1792, the beginning of "the first 
year of the French Republic." 



384 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

101. The National Convention, 1792-1795 

The National Convention contained nearly eight hundred 
members, all republicans, but republicans of diverse shades of 
Parties in opinion. One group was that of the Girondists, 
the National so-called because its leaders came from the de- 
partement of the Gironde. The Girondists repre- 
sented largely the bourgeoisie ; they desired a speedy return 
to law and order. Opposite them sat the far more radical 
and far more resolute group of Jacobins, who leaned for sup- 
port upon the turbulent populace of Paris. The majority of the 
delegates belonged to neither party and voted now on one side 
and now on the other. Eventually, however, they fell under 
Jacobin domination. 

The feud between the two parties broke out in the first days 

of the National Convention. The Jacobins clamored for the 

_ . , . death of Louis XVI as a traitor ; most of the Giron- 
Tnal and 

execution dists, less convinced of the king's guilt, would have 
yw°17m spared his life. Mob influence carried through the 
assembly, by a small majority, the vote which sent 
"Citizen Louis Capet" to the guillotine. The king's accusers 
did not have the evidence, which we now possess, proving that 
he had been in constant communication with the foreign in- 
vaders. His execution was a political measure. "Louis must 
die," urged Robespierre, " that the country may live." Danton, 
railing against the enemies of France, could now declare, 
"We have thrown them as gage of battle the head of a 
king." 

Meanwhile, the tide of foreign invasion receded rapidly. 
Two days before the inauguration of the republic the French 
Coalition stayed the advance of the allies at Valmy, scarcely 

against a hundred miles from Paris. The battle of Valmy 

France, 1793 wag & small affair, but it first gave confidence 
to the revolutionary armies and nerved them for further re- 
sistance. The French now took the offensive and invaded 
the Austrian Netherlands. Fired by these successes, the 
National Convention offered the aid of France to all nations 



The National Convention 385 

which were striving after freedom ; in other words, it proposed 
to propagate the Revolution by force of arms throughout 
Europe. This was a blow in the face to autocratic rulers and 
privileged classes everywhere. After the execution of Louis 
XVI Austria, Prussia, Great Britain, Holland, Spain, and 
Sardinia leagued together to overthrow republican France. 

The republic at the same time was threatened by domestic 
insurrection. The peasants of La Vendee, a district to the 
south of the lower Loire, were royalists in feeling Domestic 
and deeply devoted to Roman Catholicism. When insurrection 
an attempt was made to draft them as soldiers, they refused to 
serve and broke out in open rebellion. The important naval 
station of Toulon, a royalist center, surrendered to the British. 
A tremor of revolt also ran through the great cities of Lyons, 
Marseilles, and Bordeaux, whose bourgeoisie resented the radi- 
calism of the Parisian proletariat. 

The peril to the republic, without and within, showed the 
need of a strong central government. The National Conven- 
tion met this need by selecting twelve of its mem- _ .„ 

• . . . Committee 

bers to serve as a Committee of Public Safety, in of Public 

which at first Danton, and later Robespierre, was Safet y 
the leading figure. The committee received almost unlimited 
authority over the life and property of every one in France. 
It proceeded to enforce a general levy or conscription, which 
placed all males of military age at the service of the armies. 
This earliest of draft laws ran as follows : "The young men shall 
go to fight ; married men shall forge weapons and transport 
supplies ; the women shall make tents and uniforms or serve 
in the hospitals; the children shall make lint; the old men 
shall be carried to the public squares to excite the courage 
of soldiers, hatred of kings, and enthusiasm for the unity of 
the republic." Carnot, another member of the committee, 
the "organizer of victory" as he came to be called, drilled and 
disciplined the new national forces and sent them forth, singing 
the Marseillaise, 1 to battle. 

1 A patriotic song, the words and music of which were composed in 1702 by 
Rouget de Lisle. 



386 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

The mercenary troops of old Europe could not resist these 
citizen-soldiers. Filled with enthusiasm and in overwhelming 
Treaty of numbers, they soon carried the war into enemy 
Basel, 1795 territory. The grand coalition dissolved under 
the shock. By the Treaty of Basel in 1795 Prussia ceded her 
provinces on the west bank of the Rhine to France, which thus 
secured the "natural boundary" so ardently desired by Louis 
XIV. 1 During this year Spain and Holland also made peace 
with France. Holland became the Batavian Republic under 
French protection. 

The Committee of Public Safety likewise dealt effectively 
with domestic insurrection. It resorted to a policy of terrorism, 
. as a means of suppressing the anti-revolutionary 

elements. A law was passed which declared 
"suspect" every noble, every ofhce-holder before the Revo- 
lution, every person who had had any dealings with an emigre, 
and every person who could not produce a certificate of citizen- 
ship. No one could feel safe under this law. As a wit after- 
wards remarked, all France in those days went about conju- 
gating, "I am suspect, -thou art suspect, he is suspect," etc. 
Special courts were set up in Paris and the provincial cities to 
try the "suspects" and usually to order them to the guillotine. 

France endured the Reign of Terror for over a year. During 
this time several thousand persons were executed under form of 
Reign of ^ aw ' while many more were massacred without the 

Terror, pretense of a trial. The carnage spread beyond the 

non-juring clergy and the aristocracy to include 
the bourgeoisie and even many artisans and peasants. Among 
the distinguished victims at Paris were Marie Antoinette, the 
sister of Louis XVI, the duke of Orleans (a member of the royal 
house who had intrigued to get himself raised to the throne), 
and the principal Girondist leaders. Then the Terror began 
to consume its own authors. Danton, who had wearied of the 
bloodshed and counseled moderation, suffered death. " Show my 
head to the people," he said to the executioner, "they do not see 
the like every day." The fanatical Robespierre now became 
1 See the map facing page 388. 



The Directory and Napoleon 387 

the virtual dictator of France. He continued the slaughter 
for a few months until his enemies in the National Convention 
secured the upper hand, and hurried him without trial to the 
death to which he had sent so many of his fellow-citizens. 

Robespierre's execution ended the Reign of Terror. The 
policy of terrorism, however effective in crushing the enemies 
of the republic, had long since been perverted to The Con . 
partv and personal ends. The inevitable reaction stitution of 

1795 

against Jacobin tyranny followed. The bourgeoisie 
gained control of the National Convention, which now resumed 
its task of preparing a constitution for republican France. 
The new instrument of government provided for a legislature 
of two chambers and vested the executive authority in a Di- 
rectory of five members, with most of the powers of the former 
Committee of Public Safety. 

Before the constitution went into effect, Paris became the 
scene of another mob outburst. Royalists and radicals joined 

forces and advanced to the attack of the Tuileries, „ 

, . . . Napoleon 

where the National Convention was sitting. Here and the 

the rioters met such a cannonade of grape shot National 

. . , Convention 

that they fled precipitately, leaving many of their 

number dead in the streets. The man who most distinguished 

himself as the defender of law and order was the young artillery 

general, Napoleon Bonaparte. 

102. The Directory and Napoleon, 1795-1799 

Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio, Corsica, in 1769, 
only a year after that island became a French possession. 
He was the second son of an Italian jlawyer of Early life of 
noble birth but decayed fortunes. Napoleon Na P° leon 
attended a preparatory school in France and went through the 
ordinary curriculum with credit, showed proficiency in mathe- 
matics, and devoted much of his leisure to reading history. 
After a brief military training in Paris, he entered an artillery 
regiment, thus realizing his boyish desire to be a soldier. He 
was then a youth of sixteen years, poor, friendless, and with- 
out family influence. 



388 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 



Napoleon took a keen interest in the reform movement 
then stirring France. A devoted admirer of Rousseau's phi- 
Rise of losophy, he hated all privileges, all aristocracy, 
Napoleon an( j f or a time, at least, he became a Jacobin. The 
Revolution gave him his first opportunities. He commanded 
the artillery which compelled the British to evacuate Toulon 
in 1794 and two years later he helped defend the National 
Convention against the Parisian mob. Shortly afterwards 
Carnot, who divined Napoleon's genius, persuaded his colleagues 

on the Directory to intrust 
the young man with the 
command of the French 
army in Italy. 

When the Directory as- 
sumed office, France still 
numbered Great Britain, 
Napoleon in Sardinia, and 
Italy, 1796- Austria among 
1797 

her foes. Great 
Britain could not be as- 
sailed, because of the 
weakness of the French 
navy, but the other two 
countries offered fronts 
open to attack through 
northern Italy. Napo- 
leon's army, small and 
shabbily equipped, seemed a weak instrument for so formidable 
a task. But the "Little Corporal," as his men nicknamed 
him, overcame all difficulties. His brilliant strategy first sepa- 
rated the Sardinians from their Austrian allies. The king of 
Sardinia then purchased peace by the cession of Savoy and 
Nice to France. After another year of fighting, which turned 
the Austrians out of northern Italy and brought the French 
to within eighty miles of Vienna, the Hapsburg monarch also 
stooped to make terms with this ever-victorious republican 
general. 




Napoleon's Birthplace, Ajaccio 



The Directory and Napoleon 389 

Austria ceded to France the Austrian Netherlands, which 
had already been occupied by the republican armies, and 
agreed to the annexation by France of the Ger- Treaty of 
manic lands west of the Rhine. She also recog- Campo 
nized the independence of the Cisalpine Republic, 
one of Napoleon's creations in northern Italy. In return for 
these concessions, Austria received most of the Venetian terri- 
tories conquered by Napoleon, including a valuable sea-coast 
along the Adriatic. France likewise profited by this Italian 
settlement, for both the Cisalpine Republic and the tiny Ligu- 
rian Republic (Genoa and the adjacent district) were under 
French influence. 1 

Great Britain now remained the only country to contest 
French supremacy in Europe. Napoleon determined to strike 
at her through her Oriental possessions. It was Napoleon in 
necessary, first of all, to wrest Egypt from the Egypt, 1798- 
Ottoman Turks, for, as Napoleon never tired of 
asserting, "the power that is master of Egypt is master of 
India." Napoleon easily persuaded the Directory to give 
him the command of a strong expedition, which set sail from 
Toulon and reached Alexandria in safety. The Egyptian 
campaign had hardly begun before Lord Nelson, the British 
admiral, destroyed most of the French fleet, thus severing 
Napoleon's communications with Europe. The French soon 
overran Egypt, but met a severe check when they carried the 
war into Syria. Faced by the collapse of his Oriental dreams, 
Napoleon left his army to its fate and escaped to France. Here 
his highly colored reports of victories caused him to be greeted 
as the conqueror of the East. 

Affairs had gone badly for France during Napoleon's absence 
in Egypt. Great Britain, Austria, and Russia formed a second 
coalition against the republic, put large armies in 
the field, and drove the French from Italy. This of the 
misfortune sapped the authority of the Directory ? 7 gg Ctory ' 
and turned the eyes of most Frenchmen to 
Napoleon, as the one man who could guarantee victory abroad 
1 Sec the map facing page 388. 



390 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

and order at home. He took advantage of the situation 
to plan with Sieves and other politicians a coup d'etat. 1 
Three of the directors were induced to resign ; the other two 
were placed under military guard ; and the bayonets of Na- 
poleon's devoted soldiers forced the assemblies to dissolve. 
Napoleon now became virtually master of France. " I found 
the crown of France lying on the ground," he once remarked, 
"and I picked it up with the sword." Thus, within little more 
than ten years from the meeting of the Estates- General at 
Versailles, popular government gave way to the rule of one man. 
Autocracy supplanted democracy. 

103. The Consulate, 1799-1804 

After the coup d'etat Napoleon proceeded to frame a consti- 
tution. It placed the executive power in the hands of three 
The Con- consuls, appointed for ten years. The First 
stitution of Consul (Napoleon himself) was really supreme. 

1799 

To him belonged the command of the army and 
navy, the right of naming and dismissing all the chief state 
officials, and the proposal of all new laws. Napoleon then 
submitted the constitution to the people for ratification. The 
popular vote, known as a plebiscite, 2 showed an overwhelming 
majority in favor of the new government. 

The French accepted Napoleon's rule the more readily be- 
cause of the threatening war-clouds in Italy and on the Rhine. 
Marengo Though Russia soon withdrew from the second 
andHohen- coalition, Austria and Great Britain remained in 
in en ' arms against France. Napoleon now led his troops 

across the Alps by the pass of the Great St. Bernard, a feat 
rivaling Hannibal's performance, descended unexpectedly into 
Italy in the rear of the Austrian forces, and won a new triumph 
at Marengo. A few months later the French general Moreau 
inflicted a crushing defeat on the Austrians at Hohenlinden 
in Bavaria. These reverses brought the Hapsburg monarch 

1 French for a "stroke of state." 

2 From the Latin plebiscitum, referring to a vote or decree of the common people 
(pkbs). 




NAPOLEON AS FIRST CONSUL 
After the painting by J. 14. Isabey, Versailles Gallery 



The Consulate 391 

to his knees, and he agreed to a peace which reaffirmed the pro- 
visions of the Treaty of Campo Formio. 1 

Great Britain and France now took steps to end the long war 
between them. The former country was all-powerful on the sea, 
the latter, on the land ; but neither could strike 
a vital blow at the other. The Peace of Amiens, Amiens 1802 
which they concluded, proved to be a truce rather 
than a peace. However, it enabled the First Consul to drop 
the sword for a time and take up the less spectacular but more 
enduring work of administration. He soon showed himself as 
great in statecraft as in war. 

One of Napoleon's most important measures put the local 
government of all France directly under his control. He 
placed a prefect over every departement and a France 
subprefect over every subdivision of a departement. centralized 
Even the mayors of the larger towns and cities owed their 
positions to the First Consul. This arrangement enabled 
Napoleon to make his will felt promptly throughout the length 
and breadth of France. It survived Napoleon's downfall and 
still continues to be the French system of local government. 

The same desire for unity and precision led Napoleon to 
complete the codification of French law. Before the Revolution 
nearly three hundred different local codes had The law 
existed in France, giving force to Voltaire's re- codlfied 
mark that a traveler there changed his laws as often as he 
changed his post-horses. The National Convention began the 
work of replacing this multiplicity of laws — Frankish, Roman, 
feudal, and royal — by a single uniform code. Napoleon 
and the commission of legal experts over whose deliberations 
he presided finished the task after about four years' labor. 
The Code Napoleon embodied many revolutionary principles, 
such as civil equality, religious toleration, and jury trial, and 
carried these principles into the foreign lands conquered by 
the French. It is still the prevailing law of both France and 
Belgium, while the codes of modern Holland, Italy, and Portu- 
gal have taken it as a model. 

1 Treaty of LuneVille (1801). 



392 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

Napoleon also healed the religious schism which had divided 
France since the Revolution. Though not himself an adherent 
The Church of any form of Christianity, he felt the necessity 
restored f conciliating the many French Catholics who 

remained faithful to Rome. An agreement, called the Con- 
cordat, was now drawn up, providing for the restoration of 
Catholicism as the state religion. Napoleon reserved to 
himself the appointment of bishops and archbishops, and the 
pope gave up all claims to the confiscated property of the 
Church. The Concordat formed a singularly politic measure, 
for by confirming the peasantry in their possession of the 
ecclesiastical lands it bound up their interests with those of 
Napoleon. It continued to regulate the relations between 
France and the Papacy for more than a century. 1 

Nor did Napoleon forget the emigres. A law was soon 
The emigres passed extending amnesty to the nobles who had 
repatriated fl e( j f rom p rance> More than forty thousand 

families now returned to their native land. 

A long list might be drawn up of the other measures which 
exhibit Napoleon's qualities as a statesman. He founded 
Napoleon's the Bank °f France, still one of the leading financial 
other institutions of the world. He established a system 

of higher education to take the place of the colleges 
and universities which had been abolished by a decree of the 
National Convention. He planned and partly carried out 
a vast network of canals and inland waterways, thus improving 
the means of communication and trade throughout France. 
Like the Roman emperors, he constructed a system of military 
highways radiating from the capital city to the remotest dis- 
tricts, in addition to two wonderful Alpine roads connecting 
France with Italy. Like the Romans, also, he had a taste 
for building, and many of the monuments which make Paris 
so splendid a city belong to the Napoleonic era. Napoleon's 
conquests proved to be transitory, but what he accomplished 
for France in peaceful labors has endured to the present 
day. 

1 From 1802 to.1905. 



The First French Empire 



393 



104. The First French Empire, 1804 

Napoleon's victories in war and his policies in peace gained 

for him the support of all Frenchmen except the Jacobins, 

who would not admit that the Revolution had _ T 

Napoleon, 

ended, and the royalists, who wished to restore emperor of 
the Bourbon monarchy. When in 1802 the the French 
people were asked to vote on the question, "Shall Napoleon 
Bonaparte be consul for life?" the 
answering "ayes" numbered over 
three and a half millions, the "noes" 
only a few thousands. Another pleb- 
iscite in 1804 decided, by an equally 
large majority, that the First Consul 
should become emperor. Before the 
high altar of Notre Dame Cathedral 
at Paris and in the presence of the 
pope, the modern Charlemagne placed 
a golden laurel wreath upon his own 
head and assumed the title of Na- 
poleon 1, emperor of the French. 

Napoleon also proceeded to erect 
a monarchy on Italian soil. At 
Milan he crowned him- 
self king, as Charle- 
magne had done, with 
the "Iron Crown" of the Lombards. 
North Italy thus became practically 
an annex of France. 

The emperor-king set up again at 



Napoleon, 
king of 
Italy 




Cross of the Legion of 
Honor 



Instituted by Napoleon in 1802 ; 
given to both soldiers and civilians 
for distinguished services to the 
state. In the present order of the 
French Republic the symbolical head 
of the republic appears in the center, 
the Tuileries the etiquette and cere- and a laurdmeatJi replaces the bn- 

monial of the Old Regime. Already ptria crown - 
he had established the Legion of Honor to reward those who 
most industriously served him. Now he created The imperial 
a nobility. His relatives and ministers became glory 
kings, princes, dukes, and counts; his ablest generals be- 
came marshals of France. "My titles," Napoleon declared, 



394 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

"are a sort of civic crown; one can win them through one's 
own efforts." 

France, intoxicated with the imperial glory, forgot that she 
had come under the rule of one man. What hostile criticism 
The imperial Frenchmen might have leveled against Napoleon 
despotism was s ^fl e( j by ^g se cret police, who arrested and 
imprisoned hundreds of persons obnoxious to the emperor. 
The censorship of books and newspapers prevented any ex- 





A Napoleonic Medal 

A medal prepared by Napoleon to be issued at London in honor of his expected triumph. 
It represents Hercules overthrowing a merman and bears the legend Frappee a Londres — 
" Struck in London " — 1804. After a cast in the British Museum. 

pression of public opinion. Many journals were suppressed; 
the remainder were allowed to publish only articles approved 
by the government. Even the schools and churches were made 
pillars of the new order, and Napoleon went so far as to pre- 
pare a catechism setting forth the duty of good Christians to 
love, respect, and obey their emperor. In all these ways he 
established a despotism as unqualified as that of Louis XIV. 

105. Napoleon at War with Europe, 1805-1807 

The wars of the French Revolution, beginning in a conflict 
between democracy and monarchy, gradually became a means 
The ivapo- of gratifying the French lust for territorial expan- 
leonic wars ^ on With the advent of Napoleon they appeared 
still more clearly as wars of conquest. The "successor of 
Charlemagne," who carried the Roman eagles on his military 
standards, dreamed of universal sovereignty. Supreme in 
France, he would also be supreme in Europe. No lasting peace 



Napoleon at War with Europe 



395 



was possible with such a man, unless the European nations 

submitted tamely to his will. They would not submit, and 

as a result the Continent for ten years was drenched with 

blood. 

Austria in the revolutionary wars had been the chief opponent 

of France ; in the wars of Napoleon Great Britain became his 

most persistent and relentless enemy. That island- 

kingdom, which had defeated the grandiose Great 

schemes of Philip II and Louis XIV, could never ^ T ntai , n t0 
r Napoleon 

consent to the creation of a French empire re- 
stricting her trade in the profitable markets of the Continent 
and dominating western Europe. To preserve the European 




The "Victory" 

Nelson's flagship at the battle of Trafalgar. Now moored in Portsmouth Harbor, England. 

balance of power Great Britain formed coalition after coalition, 
using her money, her ships, and her soldiers unsparingly, and at 
length successfully, in the effort. 

The peace of Amiens lasted little over a year. The war 
between Great Britain and France being then renewed, Napo- 
leon made every preparation to overthrow "per- Trafalgar, 
fidious Albion." He collected an army and a flo- 1805 
tilla of flat-bottomed boats near Boulogne, apparently intending 
to "jump the ditch," as he called the Channel, and lead his sol- 
diers to London. If this was indeed his intention, it became 



396 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

impossible of accomplishment after Lord Nelson's victory off 
Cape Trafalgar, over the combined French and Spanish fleets. 
Nelson received a mortal wound in the action, but he died with 
the knowledge that his country would henceforth remain in un- 
disputed control of the seas. " England," said William Pitt, 1 
"has saved herself by her own energy, and will, I trust, save 
Europe by her example." 

Meanwhile, Pitt had succeeded in forming still another coali- 
tion against France and Napoleon. Great Britain, Austria, 
uim and Russia, and Sweden were the four allied powers. 

Austerlitz, Before they could strike a blow, Napoleon suddenly 
broke up his camp at Boulogne, moved swiftly 
into Germany, captured an entire Austrian army at Ulm, and 
entered Vienna. These successes were followed by the cele- 
brated battle of Austerlitz, a masterpiece of strategy, at which 
Napoleon with inferior numbers shattered the Austro-Russian 
forces. With his capital lost, his territory occupied, his armies 
destroyed, the Hapsburg monarch once more consented to an 
ignominious peace. The Venetian lands, which Austria ac- 
quired by the Treaty of Campo Formio, were now added to 
Napoleon's kingdom of Italy. 2 

Prussia was next to feel the mailed fist of Napoleon. Rely- 
ing upon the help of Saxony and Russia, she attempted to stay 
Jena, 1806, ^ s victorious progress, only to suffer the loss of 
and Fried- two armies in the double battle of Jena. Napoleon 
soon entered Berlin in triumph. Russia still re- 
mained formidable, until a bad defeat at Friedland induced 
the tsar, Alexander I, to make overtures for peace. 

The two emperors met at Tilsit on the river Niemen, near 
the frontier between Prussia and Russia, and concluded a 
Peace of bargain for the partition of Europe. The tsar 

Tilsit, 1807 agreed to throw over his allies and allow Napoleon 
a free hand in the West. Napoleon permitted the tsar to seize 
Finland from Sweden and promised French aid in expelling 
the Turks from Europe. When, however, the tsar, asked for 

1 Son of the earl of Chatham and prime minister, 1783-1801, 1804-1806. 

2 Treaty of Pressburg (1805). 



Napoleon's Reorganization of Europe 397 

the Turkish capital, Napoleon exclaimed, "Constantinople! 
Never ! That would be the mastery of the world." 

No sovereign in modern times was ever so powerful as Napo- 
leon after Tilsit. If he had failed on the sea, he had won 
complete success on the land, and the triumphs of The Napo- 
Ulm, of Austerlitz, of Jena, and of Friedland hid leonic armies 
from view the disaster of Trafalgar. Napoleon's victories 
are explained only in part by his mastery of the art of war. 
The emperor inherited the splendid citizen-soldiery of the 
revolutionary era, a whole nation under arms and filled with 
the idea of carrying "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" through- 
out Europe. The hired troops of the absolute monarchies, 
on the contrary, had little enthusiasm for their cause. Slight 
wonder that in conflict with them Napoleon's legions always 
gained the day. 

106. Napoleon's Reorganization of Europe 
Napoleon at the zenith of his power ruled directly over a 
large part of western Europe. Even before the Peace of Tilsit 
he had added Genoa (the Ligurian Republic) and Piedmont 
to France and had converted Holland (the former Batavian 
Republic) into a dependent kingdom. Holland imperial 
subsequently became a part of the French France 
Empire. After Tilsit he annexed the German coast as far 
as Denmark, what remained of the States of the Church, in- 
cluding Rome, and the Illyrian provinces east of Italy. Im- 
perial France touched the Baltic on the north, and on the 
south faced the Adriatic. 

Beyond the empire stood a belt of dependencies. Northern 
Italy, including the former Cisalpine Republic and the ancient 
possessions of Venice, formed a separate kingdom, Dependent 
held by Napoleon himself and administered by states 
his stepson, Eugene Beauharnais. 1 His brother Joseph gov- 
erned the kingdom of Naples in central and southern Italy. 
Switzerland, enlarged by six new cantons added to the thir- 
teen old cantons, became a vassal republic, which Napoleon 
. ' Son of Napoleon's wife, Josephine, by her first husband. 



398 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

ruled with the title of Mediator. The sections of Polish terri- 
tory seized by Prussia and Austria in the second and third 
partitions, went to form the Grand Duchy of Warsaw; not, 
however, under a Polish ruler, but under Napoleon's new ally, 
the king of Saxony. "Roll up the map of Europe," William 
Pitt had cried, when he heard the news of Austerlitz, "it will 
not be wanted these ten years." 

Napoleon's power in central Europe rested upon the Con- 
federation of the Rhine. This organization included Bavaria, 
Confedera- Baden, and Wurtemberg, and in its final form all 
tion of the the German states except Austria and Prussia. 
As sovereign of the league, under the title of Pro- 
tector, Napoleon disposed of its military forces and conducted 
its foreign relations. 

The formation of the Confederation of the Rhine gave the 

death-blow to the Holy Roman Empire. That venerable in- 

„ x . x . stitution, which went back to Otto the Great 

Extinction 

of the Holy and Charlemagne, had become little more than a 

Roman name, an empty form, a shadow without sub- 

Empire, 1806 ' ^ J 

stance. When Napoleon declared that he would 

recognize it no longer, the Hapsburg ruler laid down the crown 

and contented himself with the title of emperor of Austria. 

Many other European states not actually dependent on 

Napoleon were allied with him. They included Spain, which 

... , subsequently became a dependency, Denmark, 

Allied STiAtCS 

Norway, the kingdom of Prussia, now reduced 
to about a half of its former size, and the weakened Austrian 
Empire. But Great Britain, mistress of the seas, still held 
out against the master of the Continent. 

107. The Continental System 

The failure of Napoleon's Egyptian expedition prevented 
him from striking at Great Britain through her possessions in 
Economic the East. His hope of invading her vanished at 
warfare Trafalgar. His efforts to destroy her commerce 

by sending out innumerable privateers to prey upon it were 
foiled when British merchantmen sailed in convoys under the 



The Continental System 399 

protection of ships of war. One alternative remained. If 
British manufacturers could be deprived of their Continental 
markets and British ship-owners and sailors of their carrying 
trade, it might be possible to compel the "nation of shop- 
keepers" l to make peace with him on his own terms. 

Napoleon's successes on land enabled him to devise a scheme 
for the strangulation of Great Britain. By two decrees issued 
at Berlin and Milan he placed that country under fi 
a commercial interdict. British ships and goods Milan 
were to be excluded from France and her de- igo^is^ 
pendencies, while neutral vessels sailing from any 
British port were to be seized by French warships or privateers. 

Napoleon endeavored to enforce these decrees in the French 
Empire, the Italian kingdom, the Confederation of the Rhine, 
and the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. Russia and Extent of the 
Prussia agreed to enforce them by the terms of the Continental 
Peace of Tilsit. At one time or another all the 
states of Europe, except Great Britain and Turkey, came into 
the Continental System. 

The British government replied to the Berlin and Milan 
decrees by various Orders in Council, which forbade neutral 
ships from trading with France, her dependencies, The Orders in 
or her allies, under penalty of capture. As Napo- Council 
leon sought to exclude Great Britain from Continental markets, 
so that country sought to shut out Napoleon from maritime 
commerce. The sea-power of Great Britain enabled her to 
blockade the Continent with some degree of effectiveness. 

Napoleon, on the other hand, could not make the Continental 
System effective. British merchants always managed to smug- 
gle large quantities of goods into the European Tfae Conti _ 
countries. Some commodities which the French nentai 
absolutely required, such as woolens, had to be i„ y e s ^™ ive 
admitted into France under special license. Na- 
poleon clad his own armies in British cloth, and his soldiers 
marched in British shoes. Though Great Britain suffered 
acutely from the emperor's interference with her trade, the 

1 A Napoleonic phrase. 



400 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

Continental nations, deprived of needed manufactures and 
colonial wares, suffered still more. The result was to excite 
great bitterness against Napoleon. Nevertheless, he persisted 
in the attempt to humble his only rival by this economic war- 
fare ; as we shall now see, he staked his empire on the success 
of the Continental System. 

108. Revolt of the Nations, 1808-1814 

Napoleon hitherto had been fighting kings, not nations ; 
and he had been uniformly victorious. A change came after 
National Tilsit. The emperor's treatment of the con- 

resistance to quered peoples aroused the utmost hatred for 
him. They saw their sons dragged away by the 
conscription to fight and die in his armies ; they paid excessive 
war taxes; above all, they had to endure the high prices re- 
sulting from the Continental System. The time was near at 
hand when these burdens could no longer be borne. Hence- 
forth our chief interest is with the various nations which one 
after another rose against their common oppressor. France 
in arms made Napoleon ; Europe in arms overthrew him. 

The little kingdom of Portugal had been linked to Great 

Britain by close commercial ties for more than a century. 

Napoleon's When the Portuguese refused to close their ports 

interference to British ships, as Napoleon demanded, he sent 

in Portugal r ' r ' 

and Spain, an army into the country, seized Lisbon, and 

1807-1808 drove the royal family to Brazil. Napoleon then 
proceeded to deprive his friend and ally, Ferdinand VII, of 
the Spanish crown and gave it to his brother Joseph. These 
high-handed acts enabled the emperor to extend the Conti- 
nental System over the Iberian Peninsula. What he gained 
there was more than offset elsewhere. As soon as the Portu- 
guese government removed to Brazil, it opened that country 
to British trade, and after the Spanish monarchy fell, its colo- 
nies revolted from the mother country and admitted British 
goods. Napoleon thus unwittingly created lucrative markets 
in Latin America for his rival. 

The Portuguese and Spaniards declined to accept their 



Revolt of the Nations 



401 



French overlords and everywhere rose in revolt. Great Britain 
took a lively interest in the situation and sent an R evo i t f 
army commanded by Sir Arthur Wellesley, better Portugal 
known by his subsequent title of duke of Welling- 
ton, to help the insurgents. The French were soon driven 
out of Portugal, nor could they 
maintain themselves securely in 
Spa-in. The Peninsular War, as 
it is called, dragged on for years. 
Encouraged by the Spanish re- 
sistance, Austria tried to throw 
off the Napoleonic The Austrian 
yoke. The effort revolt, 1809 
proved to be premature, though 
Austria, fighting this time alone, 
gave Napoleon far more trouble 
than when previously she had 
the help of allies. The French 
again occupied Vienna and won 
the hard battle of Wagram. 
The peace which followed cost 
the Hapsburg ruler additional 
territory and a heavy indemnity. 
It also cost him his daughter Maria Louisa, whose hand Napo- 
leon demanded in marriage after divorcing Josephine. When 
Maria Louisa presented the emperor with a son and heir, the 
so-called "king of Rome," it must have seemed to him that his 
dynasty was at length firmly fixed on the French throne. 1 




The Duke of Wellington 

After a painting by Goya in the possession 
of the duke of Leeds. 



1 The Bonapartes 
Charles Bonaparte m. Letitia Ramolino 



JOS I'M 



Napo eon I 



king of Naples, 1806- 
1808; king of Spain, 
1808-1813 

Napoleon II 
"king of Rome," 
d. 1832 



Louis 
king of Holland, 
1806-1810 

Napoleon III 



I I 

Caroline Jerome 

m. Murat, king of Westphalia, 
king of Naples, 1807-1813 
1S0S-1815 



Napoleon 
d. 1879 



402 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

Europe, except in Spain and on the seas, now enjoyed peace 
for two years. It was a brief breathing-spell, while Napoleon 
made ready for a new and much more terrible contest. Until 
now he had induced Tsar Alexander to adhere to the Con- 
tinental System, which pressed with special severity upon 
War with Russia, an agricultural country needing large im- 
Russia, 1812 p 0rts of British manufactures. The tsar at length 
decided to break his shackles and renew trade relations between 
Russia and Great Britain. This decision left Napoleon no 
choice but go to war with him, if the Continental System 
was to be preserved. Rather than give up hope of humbling 
Great Britain, the emperor, against the advice of his wisest 
counselors, threw down the gage of battle. 

More than half a million men formed the Grand Army with 
which Napoleon began the invasion of Russia. About one- 
The ad- third of the soldiers were French ; the rest were 

vance to Germans, Italians, Poles, and other subjects of 

the empire. All western Europe had banded 
together under the leadership of one man to overthrow the 
only great state remaining unconquered on the Continent. 
The Russians offered at first little resistance, and the Grand 
Army reached the river Borodino before they turned at bay. 
A murderous conflict followed ; the French won ; and eight 
days later Napoleon entered Moscow. 

But to occupy Moscow was not to conquer Russia. The 
French did not dare follow their enemy farther into the wil- 
derness, nor could they remain for the winter in Moscow, 
owing to the scarcity of food for men and horses. The Rus- 
sian peasants burned their grain and fodder rather than 
The retreat supply the French. Moreover, a great fire, perhaps 
from Moscow ^incllecl by the Russians themselves, had destroyed 
much of the city just as the French entered it. Napoleon 
lingered for a month among the ruins of Moscow in the belief 
that Alexander would open negotiations for peace. But no 
message came from the tsar, and at last the emperor gave orders 
for the retreat. A southerly route, which the army attempted 
to follow, was blocked, and the troops had to return by the way 



Revolt of the Nations 403 

they had come, through a country eaten bare of supplies. 
Famine, cold, desertions, and the incessant raids of the Cossacks 
thinned their ranks ; and at last only a few thousand broken 
fugitives recrossed the Niemen to safety. The Grand Army 
had ceased to exist. 

This disaster, unparalleled in military annals, thrilled Prussia 
with hopes of freedom. Thanks te the labors of Baron vom 
Stein and other statesmen, it was a new Prussia The 
which confronted Napoleon. Serfdom had been Prussian 
declared illegal ; all occupations and professions 
had been opened to noble, commoner, and peasant alike; a 
state system of both elementary and secondary education had 
been established ; and the army had been reorganized on the 
basis of military service for all classes. These reforms gave to 
Prussia many of the advantages of the French Revolution and 
aroused a patriotic spirit which united the entire nation in a 
common love of country. Prussia now joined forces with 
Russia and began the War of Liberation. 

Yet so vast were Napoleon's resources that he was soon able 
to recruit a new army and take the offensive in Germany. 
He gained fresh victories, but could not follow Battle of 
them up because of the lack of cavalry. Austria Lei P zl s. 1813 
then threw in her lot with the Allies. Outnumbered and out- 
maneuvered, Napoleon fell back on Leipzig r and there in a three- 
days' "Battle of the Nations" suffered a sanguinary defeat. 
All Germany now turned against him, and he withdrew his 
shattered troops across the Rhine. 

The Allies would have made peace with Napoleon, had he 
been willing to give up his claims to the overlord- Abdication 
ship of Europe. They offered him the Rhine, the of Napoleon, 
Alps, the Pyrenees, and the Atlantic as the French 
boundaries, but he refused to accept the territorial limits that 
would have satisfied the ambitions of Louis XIV. Napoleon's 
campaigns during the early months of 1814 against three armies, 
each one larger than his own, are justly celebrated ; they 
postponed but did not prevent his overthrow. After Paris 
surrendered, the emperor gave up the useless struggle and 



404 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

signed an act of abdication renouncing for himself and for 
his heirs the thrones of France and Italy. 

109. Downfall of Napoleon, 1814-1815 

The Allies treated Napoleon with marked consideration. 
They allowed him to retain the title of emperor and assigned 
Napoleon him the island of Elba as a possession. He spent 
at Elba ^ en mon ths in this tiny principality and ruled it 

with all his accustomed energy, meanwhile keeping a watchful 
eye upon the course of events in France. 

Suddenly Europe heard with amazement that Napoleon had 
returned to France and that Louis XVIII, 1 his Bourbon suc- 
The cessor on the throne, was once more an exile. 

"Hundred ^g enthusiastic welcome which greeted the em- 
March-June, peror, as he advanced to Paris with only a small 
1815 bodyguard, bore witness at once to the magnetism 

of his personality and to the unpopularity of the Bourbons. 
In a manifesto to the French people he declared that hence- 
forth he would renounce war and conquest and would govern 
as a constitutional sovereign. The Allies, however, refused 
to accept the restoration of one whom they described as the 
"enemy and destroyer of the world's peace." The four great 
powers, Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia, proclaimed 
Napoleon an outlaw and set their armies in motion toward 
France. 

The allied armies lay in two groups behind the Sambre 

River. A mixed force ^of British, Belgians, Dutch, and Ger- 

„ iX , t mans, under the duke of Wellington, covered 

Battle of 

Waterloo, Brussels, and the Prussians, under Bliicher, held 

J""® 18 > a position farther east. Napoleon hoped to 

overcome them separately before they could con- 
centrate their overwhelming numbers. He did beat Bliicher 
at Ligny, compelling the Prussian general to retreat north- 
ward to Wavre. Bliicher's defeat made it necessary for Wel- 
lington to fall back on a strong defensive position near Waterloo, 

1 See page 379 and note 1. The young son of Louis XVI ("Louis XVII") is 
supposed to have died in a revolutionary prison in 1795. 



Downfall of Napoleon 



405 



twelve miles -south of Brussels. Here, all through a hot Sunday 
in June, Napoleon hurled his infantry and < .valry in fierce 
but ineffectual attacks against the "Iron Duke's" lines. The 
timely arrival of the Prussians from Wavre — Napoleon sup- 
posed that they had retreated toward Namur — compelled 
the French to fight 
a double battle ; 
their situation 
soon became des- 
perate ; and even 
a last charge of 
the Old Guard 
failed to restore 
the day. Repulse 
soon turned into 
a rout, and Napo- 
leon's splendid 
army broke up 
into a mob of 
fugitives. The 
emperor himself 
escaped with diffi- 
culty to Paris. 

Napoleon again abdicated and to avoid the Prussians (who 
had orders to take him dead or alive) threw himself upon the 
generosity of the British government. Then fol- The 
lowed exile to the desolate rock of St. Helena, where Napoleonic 
the fallen emperor lived for six years, without wife gei 
or child, but surrounded by a few intimate friends to whom 
he dictated his memoirs. After his death, at the early age of 
fifty-two, France forgot the sufferings he had caused her and 
remembered only his glory. Poets, painters, and singers 
created out of the "Little Corporal" a purely legendary 
figure. The world-despot appeared as the heii of the Revo- 
lution, a crusader for liberty, a foe of tyrants; and in this 
guise he found his way irresistibly to the hearts of the French 
people. 




Theater of the Waterloo Campaign 



406 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 



After Napoleon's first abdication in 1814 the victorious Allies 
concluded with France a peace which stripped her of all her 
Treatment conquests. After the emperor's second abdication 
of France - n I g I ^ foe allied powers deemed it necessary to 
impose still more humiliating conditions of peace. Though 




The Tomb of Napoleon 

In 1840 Napoleon's body was removed from St. Helena, taken with great pomp to Paris, 
and deposited in a sarcophagus of red Finland granite under the gilded dome of the Hotel des 
Invalides. Twelve colossal statues, representing the chief victories of Napoleon, surround 
the tomb, and between the figures are battleflags captured at Austerlitz. Two of the emperor's 
brothers are buried in adjoining chapels. 

France was not dismembered, she was reduced to substantially 
her old boundaries before the Revolution. 1 Furthermore, she 
had to restore all the works of art which Napoleon had pilfered 



1 See the map facing page 388. 



" Liberty, Equality, Fraternity " 



407 



from other countries, to pay an indemnity of seven hundred 
million francs, and for five years to support a foreign army in 
her chief fortresses. It is noteworthy, however, that the desire 
of Prussia for the French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine was 
not at this time gratified. 



110. "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" 
The French Revolution differed sharply from previous revolu- 
tionary movements. The Puritan Revolution and the "Glori- 
ous Revolution" in England were carried out by Principles 
men of the upper and middle classes, who wished of 1789 
to limit the royal power and establish the supremacy of Parlia- 
ment. Even the American 
Revolution was guided by 
conservative statesmen, at 
least as solicitous for the 
rights of property as for 
the rights of man. The 
French Revolution also be- 
gan mainly as a middle- 
class movement, but it soon 
reached the lower classes. 
Their principles found ex- 
pression in the famous 
motto, "Liberty, Equality, 
Fraternity." 

"Liberty" meant the recognition of popular sovereignty. 
Government was to be no longer the privilege of a divine- 
right ruler, however benevolent or "enlightened"; 
henceforth, it was to be conducted constitutionally 
in accordance with the will of the people. Since the first con- 
stitution (that of 1 791) the French have often changed their 
form of government, but they have always had a written con- 
stitution. Napoleon's plebiscites show that he paid at least 
lip homage to the principle of popular sovereignty, and it is 
certain that during both the consulate and the empire he en- 
joyed the support of the great majority of Frenchmen. On the 




Seal or the French Republic 



Liberty 



408 The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 

other hand, he did not respect all the "rights of man" which 
the revolutionists had proclaimed with such enthusiasm. 
Freedom of worship prevailed under Napoleon, but the emperor 
allowed neither free speech nor a free press. 

"Equality" meant the abolition of privilege. The Revolu- 
tion made all citizens equal before the law. It opened to every 
„ one the positions in the civil service, the Church, 
and the army. It abolished serfdom and manorial 
dues, thus destroying the last vestiges of feudalism. It sup- 
pressed the guilds, thus releasing industry from medieval 
shackles. It canceled all exemptions from taxation and sub- 
stituted a new fiscal system which taxed men according to their 
means. Most Frenchmen were content to accept Napoleon's 
rule largely because he retained and extended these achieve- 
ments of the Revolution. 

"Fraternity" meant a new consciousness of human brother- 
hood. The revolutionists set out to make France a better 
. place for every one to live in. This fraternal feel- 
ing inspired all ranks and classes of the people. It 
led to a great outburst of patriotic and national sentiment, 
which enabled the French, single-handed, to withstand Europe 
in arms. 

The principles of 1789 were not confined to France. The 
revolutionary and Napoleonic soldiers passed from land to land, 
The spirit bringing in their train the overthrow of the Old 
of 1789 Regime. The effect was profound in the Nether- 

lands, in western Germany, and in northern Italy, countries 
where the masses of the people had grievances and aspirations 
like those of the French. During the nineteenth century the 
revolutionary spirit permeated other European countries, re- 
sulting everywhere in a demand for the abolition of the estab- 
lished privileges of wealth, birth, and social position. Such 
has been the service of France as a liberator. 

Studies 

1. "The principal cause of the ruin of royalty in France was the lack of a King." 
What does this statement mean? 2. Why is July 14 observed by the French as 
the "birthday of the nation"? 3. Compare the assignats with the paper money 



" Liberty, Equality, Fraternity " 409 

issued by the Confederacy during the Civil War. 4. How did the Austrian* and 
Prussians justify their invasion of France in 1792? 5. In your opinion was there 
greater or less justification for the execution of Louis XVI than of Charles I? 6. 
What excuse can be offered for the policy of terrorism adopted by the Jacobins in 
7. Mention some conspicuous instances of mob action during the French 
Revolution. Why are mobs so often cruel and bloodthirsty? 8. Why may Na- 
poleon's coup d'etat in 1709 be regarded as the final scene of the French Revolution? 
9. How did the First Consul, to use his own words, "close" the French Revolution 
and "consolidate" its results? 10. Why was Napoleon styled by the lawyers a 
new Justinian and by the clergy a new Constantine? n. Is it correct to call 
Napoleon an "enlightened" despot? Is it incorrect to call him a "usurper"? 
12. Compare as to results the battle of Trafalgar with the destruction of the Spanish 
Armada. 13. On an outline map indicate the Napoleonic Empire at its height, 
noting also the battle-fields mentioned in this chapter. 14. How did the Conti- 
nental System help to bring about the downfall of Napoleon? 15. Why is Waterloo 
included among the world's "decisive battles"? Would it have been equally de- 
cisive if Napoleon, and not Wellington, had won ? 16. It has been said of Napoleon 
that "he was as great a* a man can be without virtue." Does this seem to be a 
fair judgment? 17. Write a character sketch (400 words) of Napoleon, baser! 
partly on the statements in the text and partly on your outside reading. 18. " Eng- 
land is the mother of liberty, France, the mother of equality." Explain this state- 
ment. 19. What was meant by describing the French revolutionary armies as 
"equality on the march"? 



CHAPTER XII 
THE DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENT IN EUROPE, 1815-1848 

111. Modern Democracy 

The idea of democracy, so emphasized by the American 
and French revolutions, has been a potent influence in molding 
What is modern history. What is democracy? The word 

democracy ? comes from the Greek and means popular rule — 
"government of the people, by the people, and for the people." 
Democracy is thus distinguished from autocracy, the rule of 
one, and from aristocracy or oligarchy, the rule of a few. 

Ancient democracy was exclusive. All the people did not 
rule, even in the most democratic of Greek cities. Slaves, 
" The a very considerable element of the population, 

people enjoyed no political rights, while freedmen and 

foreigners were seldom allowed to take part in public affairs. 
A democratic state at the present time does not recognize 
any slave class, freely admits foreigners to citizenship, and 
grants the suffrage to all native-born and naturalized men, 
irrespective of birth, property, or social condition. The recent 
extension of the suffrage to women in several progressive 
countries marks the final step in broadening the conception 
of "the people" to include practically all adult citizens. 

As a working system of government, democracy implies 
the sway of majorities. It is usually impossible to wait until 
Majorities a ^ the P eo pl e ar e of one mind regarding proposed 
and minori- measures or policies. A unanimous or nearly 
unanimous decision is best, of course ; failing that, 
we must "count heads" and see which side has the more ad- 
herents. A democratic government which did not enforce 
the will of the majority would be a contradiction in terms. 
How far should the sway of a majority go? If it goes so far 

410 



Modern Democracy 411 

as to suppress free opinion, free speech, and free discussion in 
a public press, then there is little to choose between the abso- 
lutism of a democracy and the absolutism of an autocracy. 
A majority can be as tyrannical as any divine-right monarch. 
The danger of abusing majority rule makes it necessary to 
safeguard the rights of minorities, whether great or small. 
After a decision has been reached upon any question, the 
minority should still be entitled to convert (if it can) the major- 
ity to its views by free and open debate. In this way demo- 
cratic government comes to rest upon common consent, upon 
the willing cooperation of all the citizens. 

Democracy in antiquity was direct, while that of to-day is 
representative. Every citizen of Athens or Rome had a right 
to appear and vote in the popular assembly. 
With the growth of modern states this form of represent- 

eovernment became impossible. The population ative de ~ 
° * r r mocracy 

was too large, the distances were too great, for all 

the citizens to meet in public gatherings. Voters now simply 

choose some one to represent them in a parliament or congress. 

The representative system, though not unknown to the Greeks 

and Romans, was little used by them. It developed during 

the Middle Ages, when such countries as Denmark, _ 

' ' Develop- 

Sweden, the Netherlands, France, and England ment of 
established legislative bodies representing the representa- 
three "estates" of clergy, nobility, and commoners. 
Most of these medieval legislatures afterwards disappeared or 
sank into insignificance, but the English Parliament continued 
to lead a vigorous existence. It thus furnished a model for 
imitation, first by the American colonies, then by revolutionary 
France, and during the past hundred years by nearly all Europe. 
We have already learned how the builders of the United 
States set up what may be called a presidential system. 1 They 
provided for a president elected for a fixed term, presidential 
gave him executive authority, and sharply sepa- and cabinet 
rated his functions from those of the legislature. sys ' 
In Great Britain, on the other hand, a so-called cabinet system 
1 See page 342. 



412 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

arose during the eighteenth century, by which a cabinet, or 
body of ministers, executes the laws subject to the oversight 
and control of the legislature. 1 This system has now been 
extended by Great Britain to her self-governing Dominions 
in South Africa, Australasia, and Canada. It has also been 
adopted by most Continental states. Both presidential and 
cabinet systems are democratic. The differences between 
them relate simply to the machinery by which the people rule. 

Democracy does not necessarily imply a republican form of 

government. The establishment of the United States did, 

indeed, lead almost immediately to the formation 

and dem- of the first French Republic, and the examples 

ocratic fa us se |- were soon followed by the Spanish- 

monarchies . , . 

American colonies after their separation from the 

mother country. On the other hand, Great Britain, Italy, and 

certain other European states have succeeded in developing 

governments which, though monarchical in form, are democratic 

in substance. The king still reigns by hereditary succession, but 

he does not rule. The popularly elected president of a republic 

often has more power than one of these democratic monarchs. 

Modern democracy is constitutional in form. There is 

generally a written constitution, of a more or less liberal type, 

. 1# to guarantee the rights of the people. The 
Constitutions c . r- x- 

first document of this sort for any country was 
the Union of Utrecht (1579), by which the northern provinces 
of the Netherlands bound themselves together, "as if they 
were one province," to maintain their liberties "with life- 
blood and goods" against Spain. The second was the Crom- 
wellian Instrument of Government (1653). The third was the 
Constitution of the United States, framed in 1787. The 
fourth was the French constitution which went into effect in 
1 791. All these documents, it should be noticed, were of 
revolutionary origin; they testified to the success of armed 
rebellion against the legal government. The same thing will 
be found true of many other constitutions secured by European 
peoples during the nineteenth century. 

1 See page 483. 



Restoration of the Dynasties 413 

112. The Congress of Vienna 

The close of the revolutionary and Napoleonic era found 
Europe in confusion. The French Revolution had destroyed 
the Old Regime in France, and Napoleon Bona- Purpose of 
parte had given new rulers or new boundaries the con £ ress 
to almost every Continental state. While the fallen emperor 
was still at Elba, a great international congress met at Vienna 
in September, 1814, to restore the old dynasties and remake 
the European map. The powers represented were Great Britain, 
Austria, Prussia, Russia, Sweden, Portugal, Spain, and France. 

The congress formed a brilliant assemblage of emperors, 
kings, princes of every rank, and titled diplomats. A single 
drawing room sometimes held Alexander I, tsar Membership 
of Russia ; Francis I, emperor of Austria ; Fred- of the 
erick William III, king of Prussia; the duke of 
Wellington, the German patriot Stein, the Austrian minister 
Metternich, and the French representative Talleyrand. The 
final decision as to all questions obviously lay with the four 
powers whose alliance had overthrown Napoleon, until Talley- 
rand's skillful management secured the admission of France 
to their councils as a fifth great power. When the wheels of 
diplomacy had been well oiled by banquets, balls, and other 
festivities, the monarchs and their advisers undertook the 
reconstruction of Europe. 

Only by courtesy could the meeting at Vienna be called a 
congress. As a matter of fact, it never held open sessions 
with general debates. All the work was done Nature of 
privately by committees of plenipotentiaries, who the co 11 ^ 83 
signed treaties between the various states. These treaties 
were then brought together in a single document called the 
Final Act of the Congress of Vienna (June, 181 5). 

113. Restoration of the Dynasties 

The aristocrats who assembled at Vienna were opposed, 
naturally enough, to all the democratic or liberal sentiments 
which had been awakened in Europe since 1789. The French 



414 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

Revolution appeared to them as merely a revolt against 
authority, a revolt which had overturned the social order, de- 
The congress stroyed property, sacrificed countless human lives, 
and de- and introduced confusion everywhere. Blind to 

the true significance of the demand for liberty and 
equality, they sought to bring back the Old Regime of abso- 
lutism, privilege, and divine right. Their ideal was Europe 
before 1789. 

The first business at Vienna was therefore the restoration 
of the old dynasties. The congress asserted the right of Euro- 
" Legiti- pean monarchs to govern their former subjects, ir- 

macy respective of the latter's wishes or of the claims 

of the rulers whom Napoleon had established. Talleyrand 
dignified this principle under the name of "legitimacy." 

Louis XVIII, who now went back to France, was an old 
gentleman of sixty, and so fat and gouty that he could not 
Louis xvili sit a horse. This cool, cautious Bourbon wanted 
in France ^ Q en j y his power in peace ; like Charles II of 
England, he had no desire to set out on his travels again. He 
realized that to most Frenchmen absolutism had become in- 
tolerable and that the main results of the revolutionary and 
Napoleonic era must be preserved. Accordingly, Louis XVIII 
retained such institutions as the Code, the Concordat, the 
Bank of France, and the imperial nobility, and renewed a 
charter or constitution, which he had granted in 18 14. It 
guaranteed freedom of the press, religious toleration, and the 
inviolability of sales of land made during the Revolution. 
The restoration of the Bourbon monarchy did not mean the 
restoration of the Old Regime in France. 

Ferdinand VII, another king whom Napoleon had de- 
throned, went back to Spain. This Spanish Bourbon had no 
Ferdinand sooner recovered his crown than he began to 
VII in spam swee p away all traces of revolutionary ideas and 
institutions introduced by the French. A constitution, modeled 
upon that of France, which the Spaniards had framed in 181 2, 
was suppressed, because it denied divine right and asserted the 
sovereignty of the people. The old privileges of the clergy 




PRINCE METTERNICH 

After the painting by Sir Thomas Lawrence. In possession of Prince Richard Metter- 
nich-Winneburg. 



Territorial Readjustments 415 

and nobility were reaffirmed. The censorship of books and news- 
papers, the prohibition of public meetings, and the imprison- 
ment or banishment of all those suspected of liberal opinions 
showed clearly the reactionary character of the new government. 
Still other dispossessed monarchs profited by the principle 
of "legitimacy." The king of Sardinia regained Nice, Savoy, 
and Piedmont on the mainland, together with Restorations 
the former republic of Genoa as an additional in Italy 
protection against France. "Republics are no longer fashion- 
able," said the tsar to a Genoese deputation which had objected 
to this arbitrary arrangement. Sicily and Naples were again 
combined to form the kingdom of the Two Sicilies under a 
Bourbon ruler. The pope, whom Napoleon had deprived of 
temporal sovereignty, recovered the States of the Church. 
All these restored princes governed without constitutions or 
parliaments. They used their absolute power to get rid of 
every trace of the revolutionary era, even uprooting French 
plants in the botanical gardens and abolishing vaccination 
and gas street lamps as nefarious French innovations. The 
restorations in Italy also spelled reaction. 

114. Territorial Readjustments 

As we have already learned, the fraternal or patriotic feel- 
ings so deeply stirred during the revolutionary and Napoleonic 
era put renewed emphasis on the rights of nation- The congress 
alities. Patriots in one country after another and national- 
boldly declared that no nation, however small or 
weak, should be governed by foreigners. Every nation, on 
the contrary, ought to be free to choose its own form of govern- 
ment and manage its own affairs. To such "submerged 
nationalities" as the Belgians, Bohemians, Poles, and Magyars 
this principle held out the hope of independence ; to the 
Italians and the Germans it held out the hope of unification. 
Like the "enlightened despots," however, the rulers and diplo- 
mats at Vienna willfully disregarded all national aspirations. 
They treated the European peoples as so many pawns in the 
game of diplomacy. 



416 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

In general, the territorial readjustments made by the congress 
were intended to compensate the great powers for their exertions 
" Compensa- against Napoleon. Land hunger thus influenced 
tions " ^g Vienna settlement, as it had influenced the 

earlier treaties of Utrecht and Westphalia. The principle 
of "compensations," however, had to be modified by the 
assumed necessity of strengthening the neighbors of France 
against future aggression on the part of that country. The 
total result was a new map of Europe. 

The oldest and most successful of Napoleon's enemies, Great 
Britain, did not desire Continental territories. She received 
Great colonial possessions as payment, including Helgo- 

Britain j and in ^ N or th Sea and Malta and the Ionian 

Islands in the Mediterranean. Great Britain also retained the 
former Dutch colonies of Ceylon, Cape Colony, and Guiana, 
which had been appropriated during the Napoleonic wars. 1 

A new state arose across the Channel. In order to com- 
pensate the Dutch for the loss of their possessions overseas 
Kingdom of anc ^ at tne same time to set up a strong bulwark 
the Nether- against France, the congress united the Austrian 
Netherlands — modern Belgium — with Holland. 
The kingdom of the Netherlands, as thus established, was 
under the rule of the house of Orange. This arbitrary union 
of Belgians and Dutch soon led to acute friction between the 
two peoples. 

As compensation for the cession of the Austrian Netherlands, 
Austria secured Lombardy and Venetia, the two richest prov- 
inces in Italy. She also received the Illyrian 

Austris. 

lands along the Adriatic coast, part of Poland 
(Galicia), and all the other territory taken from her by Napo- 
leon. Austria was now a state geographically compact, center- 
ing round the middle Danube and controlling North Italy 
and the northern Adriatic. 

The Prussian kingdom, whose limits had been so reduced 
by Napoleon, recovered part of Poland (Posen), took over 
from Sweden what remained of western Pomerania, and ab- 

i A part of Guiana (Surinam) was kept by the Dutch. 



Territorial Readjustments 417 

sorbed about half of Saxony, a state which had been one of 
Napoleon's allies. Prussia also annexed much additional terri- 
tory on the lower Rhine. In spite of these terri- _ 

r t Prussia 

torial acquisitions, Prussia remained almost as 

unformed as in the eighteenth century, with her dominions 

scattered throughout Germany. 

Another great power widened its boundaries at this time. 
Russia kept Finland, taken from Sweden in 1809, and Bes- 
sarabia, wrested from Turkey in 181 2. In addi- _ 

J Russia 

tion, Russia obtained the lion's share of Napo- 
leon's Grand Duchy of Warsaw. Tsar Alexander proceeded to 
set up a kingdom of Poland, with himself as king. 

For the cession of western Pomerania to Prussia and of 
Finland to Russia, Sweden found compensation in taking 
Norway from Denmark. The only excuse for this action was 
the former alliance of the Danes with Napoleon, 
an alliance which had been practically forced 
upon them. The Norwegians themselves resented the new 
arrangement, preferring a Danish to a Swedish ruler. Though 
compelled to submit, they succeeded in keeping their own 
government, constitution, and laws. Their union with the 
Swedes lasted just ninety years. 

The Swiss Confederation, or Switzerland, whose independence 
had been recognized at the Peace of Westphalia, received 
its final form at the Congress of Vienna. Three 
new cantons were added to the nineteen in existence 
before 1815. The great powers also signed a treaty promising 
never to declare war against Switzerland or to send troops 
across the Swiss borders. The little Alpine republic became 
in this way a neutral buffer state in the heart of Europe. 

The settlement of Vienna left Italy a mosaic of nine states. 1 
Of these, Sardinia formed an independent kingdom. Lom- 
bardy and Venetia were Austrian provinces. Disunion of 
Parma, Modena, Tuscany, and Lucca were duchies, Italy in 18i5 
all but the last under rulers belonging to the Hapsburg family. 
Austrian influence also prevailed in the States of the Church 

1 Eleven, if Monaco and San Marino be included. Sec the map on page 454. 



4i 8 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

and in the Two Sicilies. Thus Austria, a foreign power, fixed 
its grip upon the Italian peninsula. Italy, in Metternich's 
contemptuous phrase, was only "a geographical expression." 

Germany after the settlement of Vienna included thirty- 
nine states and free cities, of which the most extensive were 
Disunion of the Austrian Empire and the five kingdoms of 
Germany in Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Wiirtemberg, and Han- . 

over. Stein and his fellow-patriots wished to 
bring them all into a strongly knit union. This proposal 
encountered the opposition of Metternich, who feared that a 
united Germany would not serve Austrian interests. Metter- 
nich found support among the German rulers themselves, not 
one of whom would surrender any particle of his authority. 
The outcome was the creation of the Germanic Confeder- 
ation, a loose association of sovereign princes with a Diet 
or assembly presided over by a representative of the Austrian 
emperor. 1 

The Congress of Vienna may properly be charged with 
grave shortcomings. It rode rough-shod over popular rights 
Balance of and disappointed the hopes of Germans, Italians, 
power Norwegians, Poles, and Belgians for freedom. 

Its failure to satisfy either the democratic or national aspirations 
of Europe has left a heritage of trouble even to our own day. 
The political history of the last hundred years is very largely 
concerned with the triumph of both democracy and nationalism, 
and the consequent changes of territory and government. 
What the Viennese map makers constructed was not a lasting 
settlement of the difficult problems before them, but rather 
a new balance of power, cunningly contrived yet nevertheless 
unstable. There now remained, as in the eighteenth century, 
five great states : Great Britain and France in the west ; Austria 
and Prussia competing in the center; and in the east Russia. 
No one of them was strong enough to dominate the others. 
Together they managed to preserve peace in Europe for the 
next forty years. 

1 Both the kingdom of Prussia and the Austrian Empire contained territories 
not included in the confederation. See the map facing page 462. 



" Metternichismus " and the Concert of Europe 419 

115. " Metternichismus " and the Concert of Europe, 1815- 

1830 

Austria, now the leading Continental state, consisted of 
more than a score of territories inhabited by uncongenial 
Germans, Magyars, Slavs, Rumanians, and Reactionary 
Italians. To keep them united under a single Austna 
scepter, the Hapsburgs deliberately repressed all agitation 
for independence or self-government. The Hapsburgs felt it 
equally necessary to discourage every popular movement, 
which, starting in Italy or Germany, might spread like an 
infection to their own dominions. "My realm," confessed the 
emperor Francis I, "is like a worm-eaten house ; if a part of it 
is removed, one cannot tell how much will fall." Force of 
circumstances thus placed Austria at the forefront of the 
reaction against democracy. 

The spirit of reactionary Austria seemed incarnate in Prince 

Clemens Metternich. He belonged to an old and distinguished 

familv from the Rhinelands, entered the diplo- __ „ 

r Metternich 

matic service of Austria, and during the Napoleonic 
era rose to be the chief representative of the Hapsburg emperor 
at Paris. An aristocrat to his finger-tips, polished, courtly, 
tactful, clever, this man soon became the real head of the 
Austrian government and the most influential diplomat in 
Europe. To the rule of Napoleon succeeded the rule of Metter- 
nich. The German word Metternichismus has been coined to 
express the ideas which he championed and the measures which 
he enforced. 

Metternich regarded absolutism and divine right as the 
pillars of stable government. Democracy, he declared, could 
only "change daylight into darkest night." All The Metter- 
demands for constitutions, parliaments, and repre- mch s y stem 
sentative institutions must consequently be opposed to the 
uttermost. In order to stamp out the "disease of liberalism," 
let spies and secret police be multiplied, press and pulpit kept 
under gag-laws, the universities sharply watched for dangerous 
teachings, and all agitators exiled, imprisoned, or executed. 



420 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

Such measures of repression seemed quite feasible at a time 
when the majority of European peoples were ignorant peasants, 
far removed from public life. Democratic ideas could only 
find followers among the workingmen of the cities and in the 
educated bourgeoisie, both very small and defenseless when 
confronted by the powerful forces at the disposal of govern- 
ments. Metternich first established his system in Austria and 
then found in the Concert of Europe the means of extending 
it to other parts of the Continent. 

The states whose coalitions overthrew Napoleon became in 
1 815 the arbiters of Europe. Great Britaifi, Austria, Prussia, 
Formation of and Russia renewed their alliance, in order to 
the Concert preserve the dynastic and territorial arrangements 
made by the Congress of Vienna. In 1818 France under 
Louis XVIII was admitted into the sacred circle of the alliance. 
The French, during three years' probation, had fulfilled the 
obligations imposed upon them by the Allies after Waterloo 
and, as far as appearances went, had extinguished forever their 
revolutionary fires. These five great powers, as long as they 
worked in harmony, could enforce their will on all the smaller 
states. They formed, in effect, a European Concert. 

The agreements establishing the Concert pledged its members 
to the maintenance of "public peace, the tranquillity of states, 
Defects of the inviolability of possessions, and the faith of 
the Concert treaties." High sounding words ! Europe in 181 5 
was not ready for a genuine international league to safeguard 
the rights of each country, whether big or little. The defects 
of the Concert were obvious. First, it did not extend to Tur- 
key in Europe, whose Christian inhabitants languished under 
the tyranny of the Sultan. Second, it was dynastic rather 
than popular in character — a union of sovereigns instead of 
peoples. Of the five leading states, all but Great Britain were 
divine-right monarchies. Third, it lacked effective machinery 
for reconciling the contrary interests, ambitions, and jealousies 
of the members. The Concert, in short, formed only a distant 
approach to the ideal of a confederated Europe, of a common- 
wealth of nations. 



" Metternichismus " and the Concert of Europe 421 

One of the clauses of the treaty of alliance between the 
powers had provided that they should hold congresses from 
time to time for consideration of the measures i nter na- 
"most salutary for the repose and prosperity of tionai con- 
nations and for the peace of Europe." Four such 
congresses ' were convoked by Metternich, whose diplomatic 
genius turned them into agencies of reaction. At the Con- 
gress of Troppau in 1820 he even succeeded in inducing the 
sovereigns of Austria, Prussia, and Russia to sign a protocol, 
or declaration, formally outlawing all revolutions. According 
to the principle there announced, a state which underwent 
a revolutionary change of government was to be brought 
back, peacefully or by force, "into the bosom of the Great 
Alliance." 

The Protocol of Troppau announced a doctrine new to inter- 
national law. The European autocrats now boldly asserted 
their right, and even their duty, to intervene Armed 
in the affairs of any country for the suppression interventlon 
of democratic or national movements. France did not sign 
this outrageous document. Neither did Great Britain. Her 
statesmen, members of a government which dated from the 
"Glorious Revolution" of 1688, had now begun to compre- 
hend the real character of the Concert as directed by Metter- 
nich, and to see in it a deadly menace to the liberties of Europe. 
Undaunted by British protests, however, the three eastern 
powers prepared for armed intervention. 

1820 was a year of revolutions. A widespread uprising in 
Spain against Ferdinand VII forced that tyrannical monarch 
to restore the constitution of 181 2 and to convene Revolutions 
a liberal parliament. An insurrection in Portugal of 1820 
overthrew the regency which had governed there since the 
removal of the royal family to Brazil during the Napoleonic 
era. 2 John VI, then reigning in Brazil, returned to Portugal 
and promised to rule as a constitutional sovereign. Encour- 
aged by these successes, the people of Naples (a part of the 

1 Aix-la-Chapelle (1818), Troppau (1S20), Laibach (1821), and Verona (1822). 

2 See page 400. 




422 



" Metternichismus " and the Concert of Europe 423 

kingdom of the Two Sicilies) compelled their Bourbon prince 

to grant a constitution. 

Metternichismus did not long remain on the defensive. An 

Austrian army quickly occupied Naples and restored "order" 

and absolutism. In the reaction which followed „ . . 

i-iiii 1 • Revolution 

the liberal leaders were hurried to the dungeon suppressed 

and the scaffold. Almost at the same time a 1 "i! aly ' 

1821 

revolt in the Sardinian kingdom (Piedmont) 

collapsed under the pressure of eighty thousand Austrian 
bayonets. Metternich felt well satisfied with his work. "I 
see the dawn of a better day," he wrote. "Heaven seems to 
will it that the world shall not be lost." 

Armed intervention soon registered another triumph. The 
three eastern powers commissioned France to act Revolution 
as their agent to subdue the turbulent Spaniards, suppressed 
Great Britain protested vigorously against this m pain ' 
action and asserted the right of every people to determine 
its own form of government. Her protests were unheeded. 
French troops crossed the Pyrenees and put Ferdinand once 
more on his autocratic throne. The king then proceeded to 
inaugurate a reign of terror, exiling, imprisoning, and execut- 
ing liberals by the thousands. It is a sorry chapter in Spanish 
history. 

The sovereigns were now ready to crusade against freedom 
in Spain's American colonies, which had revolted against the 
mother land. Both Great Britain and the United Breaches in 
States felt thoroughly alarmed at the prospect the Euro- 
of European interference in the affairs of the 
New World. George Canning, the British foreign minister, 
made it clear to the governments of France, Austria, Prussia, 
and Russia that, as long as Great Britain controlled the seas, 
no country other than Spain should acquire the colonies either 
by cession or by conquest. Canning's policy received the em- 
phatic support of President Monroe in his message to Con- 
gress (1823), in which he said : "We owe it, therefore, to candor, 
and to the amicable relations existing between the United States 
and those powers, to declare that we should consider any 



424 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of 
this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety." l 
Shortly afterwards both the United States and Great Britain 
recognized the independence of the Spanish-American republics. 
A second breach in the European Concert opened when Russia, 
absolutist but orthodox, supported a rebellion of the Greeks 
against their Turkish oppressors. It remained, however, 
for another democratic revolution in France to deal the most 
effective blow against Metternich and all his works. 

116. France and the "July Revolution," 1830 

Though Louis XVIII called himself king "by the grace of 
God" and kept the white flag of the Bourbon family, he ruled 
Reign of ^ n ^ ac ^ as a constitutional monarch. The Charter 

Louis xvill, of 1814 2 established a legislature of two houses, 
the upper a Chamber of Peers appointed for life, 
the lower a Chamber of Deputies chosen for a term of years. 
A high property qualification for the suffrage restricted the 
right of voting for deputies to less than one hundred thousand 
persons out of a population of twenty-nine million. The mass 
of the citizens — bourgeoisie, workingmen, and peasants — 
could neither elect nor be elected to office. The French govern- 
ment thus remained far removed from democracy. 

As long as Louis XVIII lived, he kept some check upon the 
royalists, who wished to get back all their old wealth and 
Reign of privileged position. The accession of his brother, 

Charles x, the count of Artois, 3 under the title of Charles X, 
seated the reactionary elements firmly in the 
saddle. It was well said of Charles X that after long years of 
exile he had "learned nothing and forgotten nothing." A 
thorough believer in absolutism and divine right, the king tried 
to rule as though the Revolution had never taken place. His 
disregard of the constitution and arbitrary conduct soon pro- 
voked an uprising. 

Paris in July, 1830, as in July, 1789, was the storm-center of 
the revolutionary movement. Workingmen and students raised 

1 The so-called Monroe Doctrine. 2 See page 414. 3 See page sjq and note 2. 



France and the "July Revolution" 425 



barricades in the narrow streets and defied the government. 
After three days of fighting against none-too-loyal Divine right 
troops, the revolutionists gained control of the overthrown 
capital. Charles X fled to England, and the tricolor once more 
flew to the breeze in France. 
Those who carried through 
the uprising in Paris wanted 
a republic, but C onstitu- 
thev found little tionalism 
preserved 
support among 

the liberal bourgeoisie. Men 
of this class feared that a re- 
publican France would soon 
be at war with monarchical 
Europe. Largely influenced 
by the aged Lafayette, the 
Republicans agreed to accept 
another king, in the person 
of Louis Philippe, duke of 
Orleans. He took the crown 
now offered to him by the Chamber of Deputies, at the same 
time promising to respect the constitution and the liberties 
of Frenchmen. 

The new sovereign belonged to the younger, or Orleans, 
branch of the Bourbon family. 1 He had participated in the 

1 Bourbon Dynasty 
Henry IV (1589-1610) 

I 
Louis XIII (1610-1643) 




Louis Philippe 

After a painting made in 1S41. 



Louis XIV (1643-1715) 

I 
Louis X\ 1 1 7 1 5—1 774) 
great-grandson of Louis XIV 

I 
Louis the I tauphin (d. 1765) 



tike of 



Philippe, duke of Orleans 



Louis Philippe (executed 1793) 






Louis Philippe I [830 1848) 
Louis XVI (1774-1792) Louis XVIII Charles X great-great-great-grandson 

(1814-1824) (1824-1830) of Philippe 

count of Provence count of Artois 
"Louis XVII" (d. 1795) 



426 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

events of 1789, had joined the Jacobin Club, had fought in 
revolutionary battles, and during a visit to the United States 
The " Citizen had become acquainted with democratic ideals and 
King " principles. To this "Citizen King," who reigned 

"by the grace of God and by the will of the people," France now 
gave her allegiance. 

117. The "July Revolution" in Europe 

The events in France created a sensation throughout Europe. 
The reactionaries were horrified at the sudden outburst of a 
Effect of revolutionary spirit which for fifteen years they 

the "July had endeavored to suppress; the liberals were 
encouraged to renewed agitation for self-gov- 
ernment and national rights. Widespread disturbances in 
the Netherlands, Poland, Italy, and Germany compelled Metter- 
nich to abandon all thought of intervening to restore "legit- 
imacy" in France. 

The union between the former Austrian Netherlands and 

Holland, made by the Congress of Vienna, proved to be very 

unfortunate. Differences of language, religion, 
Antagonism ... 

between and culture kept the two countries apart. Though 

Belgians about one-half of the Belgians were Flemings 

and Dutch . . 

and hence closely akin to the Dutch in blood and 

speech, the other half were French-speaking Walloons. Both 

Flemings and Walloons felt a religious antipathy to the Prot- 

esta'nt Dutch. Both alike had French sympathies and looked 

toward Paris for inspiration rather than toward The Hague. The 

antagonism between the two peoples might have lessened in time, 

had not the government of Holland incensed Belgian patriots by 

imposing upon them Dutch law, Dutch as the official language, 

and Dutch control of the army, the civil service, and the schools. 

Just a month after the uprising in Paris, Brussels responded 

to the revolutionary signal. The insurrection soon spread 

The insur- to tne provinces and led to a demand for com- 

rection in plete separation from Holland. The French 

government under Louis Philippe naturally favored 

this course, and Great Britain, a champion of small nationalities, 



The " July Revolution " in Europe 427 




also gave it her approval. The three eastern powers would 
gladly have intervened to prevent such a breach of the Vienna 
settlement, but Austria and Russia had disorders of their 



428 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

own to quell, and Prussia did not dare, single-handed, to take 
action which might bring her into collision with France. 

Under these circumstances an international conference met 
at London in 183 1. It decided that Belgium should be "an 
Independent independent and perpetually neutral state," with 
and neutral Leopold of Saxe-Coburg as the first ruler. The 
British had to blockade the Dutch coast and the 
French to occupy Antwerp before the king of Holland would 
consent to this arrangement. He did not recognize the in- 
dependence of Belgium until 1839. In that year Belgian 
neutrality was further guaranteed by a treaty to which Great 



CtrtU&. 



VT1 



IVO^KX, 



fiS^i^/L^jnJ- mu£<L.. £&k. tew. &ou*£, d '<r&eruer CeMi, 

Facsimile of Article VII of the Treaty of 1839 

"Belgium, within the limits specified in Articles I, II and IV, shall form an independent 
and perpetually neutral state. It shall be bound to observe such neutrality toward all other 
states." 

Britain, France, Austria, Prussia, and Russia pledged their 

faith. Thus a new state, under a new dynasty, was added 

to the European family of nations. 

The disposition of the grand duchy of Luxemburg (originally 

a part of the Holy Roman Empire) formed a troublesome 

problem for the powers. The Congress of Vienna 
Luxemburg \ r ° 

had made it a member of the Germanic Con- 
federation, intrusting its sovereignty and vote in the confeder- 
ation to the king of the Netherlands. The decision reached 
in 1 83 1 was to give eastern Luxemburg, together with Limburg, 
to Holland, while the Walloon or western part of Luxemburg 
remained under Belgium. The Dutch king accepted this 
partition eight years later. 1 

1 Upon the dissolution of the Germanic Confederation in 1866, Limburg was 
incorporated with Holland. Dutch Luxemburg became an independent state in 



The " July Revolution " in Europe 429 

Like the Belgians, the Poles were one of the "submerged 
nationalities" of the nineteenth century. The Congress of 
Vienna, it will be remembered, had maintained . . 

Antagonism 

the results of the former partitions, giving the between 

greater part of Poland to Russia, but allowing £ oles . and 

-K.ussi9.ns 

Prussia and Austria to keep, respectively, Posen 

and Galicia. Russian Poland became a self-governing, consti- 




POLAVD I\ THE NINETEENTH Cl.NTl KV 



tutional stale, with the tsar, Alexander I, as its king. This 
experiment in liberalism did not last long. Alexander I, who 
fell more and more under Metternich's reactionary influence, 
proceeded to curtail Polish rights and privileges, and the 

1867, with its neutrality guaranteed by the European powers, including Prussia. 
Until 1890, however, it was ruled by the kings of Holland. 



430 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

accession in 1825 of his brother, Nicholas I, placed on the 
throne an inflexible opponent of free institutions. Such was the 
situation when news of the revolution in Paris reached Warsaw. 

The insurrection which now broke out in the capital soon 
became general throughout the country. It found no support 
The insur- w i tn the Austrian and Prussian governments, 
rection in while France and Great Britain were too far away 
to lend effective. aid. Having crushed the revolt, 
Tsar Nicholas determined to uproot all sense of nationality 
among the Poles. He revoked their constitution, abolished 
their Diet, suppressed their flag, and exiled or executed thou- 
sands of Polish patriots. Poland was flooded with Russian 
agents, the Russian tongue was made the official language, 
and the Polish army was incorporated with the imperial troops. 
Poland became, as far as force could make her, simply another 
province of Russia. 

Revolution in Italy proved to be likewise abortive. This 
time not the Sicilian and Sardinian kingdoms, but the States 
The situation of the Church and Parma and Modena formed 
in Italy ^e cen t ers f disturbance. The revolutionists 

raised a new tricolor of red, white, and green (which sub- 
sequently became the Italian flag), declared the pope deposed 
from temporal power, and drove out the sovereigns of the two 
duchies. No help reached the patriots from Louis Philippe, 
as they had expected, nor did the people of the other Italian 
states rally to their support. The result might have been 
foreseen. Metternich's Austrian soldiers quickly extinguished 
the insurrectionary fires and restored the exiled rulers. Italy 
remained a Hapsburg province. 

The discontent which had been smoldering in Germany 
since 181 5 also flamed forth into revolution. Popular out- 
The situation breaks led in Saxony to the grant of a consti tu- 
rn Germany ^{ 0Uj an( j m Hanover and Brunswick, which 
already enjoyed constitutional government, to further liberal 
measures. But the movement made no more progress, for the 
great states, Austria and Prussia, remained quiet. The Diet 
of the confederation, upon Metternich's motion, passed a decree 



The " July Revolution " in Europe 431 

declaring all concessions wrung from a sovereign by violent 
means to be null and void ; while another decree announced 
that a parliament which refused taxes to the head of a state 
might be coerced by the confederation's troops. These re- 
pressive measures had their effect in reducing Germany to its 
former condition of political stagnation. 

Notwithstanding the setbacks to the cause of democracy and 
nationalism in Poland, Italy, and Germany, the year 1830 
marks an important stage in the decline of Metier- significance 
nichismus and the system of armed intervention. of 183 ° 
Both the overthrow of the restored Bourbon monarchy in 
France and the disruption of the kingdom of the Netherlands 
threatened the stability of the treaties made in 181 5. In the 
one case, the powers had to abandon, as far as France was 
concerned, the precious doctrine of "legitimacy" and to ac- 
quiesce in the right of the French nation to determine its own 
form of government. In the other case, they had to submit 
to a radical modification of the territorial settlement of Vienna. 

The next eighteen years of European history witnessed no 
conspicuous triumphs for either democracy or nationalism on 
the Continent. Italy and Germany remained From 1830 
as disunited as ever. Bohemia and Hungary t0 1848 
continued to be subject to the Hapsburgs, and Poland, to the 
Romanovs. Metternich, though growing old and weary, still 
kept his power at Vienna. The new rulers who came to the 
throne at this time — Ferdinand I x in Austria and Frederick 
William IV 2 in Prussia — were no less autocratic than their 
predecessors. But beneath the surface discontent and unrest 
intensified, becoming all the stronger because so sternly re- 
pressed by the governments. Journalists, lawyers, professors, 
and other liberal-minded men, who might have been mere re- 
formers, adopted radical and even revolutionary views and 
sought with increasing success to impress them upon the work- 
ing classes of the cities, the hungry proletariat who wanted 
freedom and who wanted bread. From time to time mutterings 
of the coming storm were heard ; it burst in France. 

1 Son of Francis I (1792-1835)- 2 Sonof Frederick William III (1707-1840). 



432 The Democratic Movement in Europe 



118. The " February Revolution " and the Second French 
Republic, 1848 

Louis Philippe posed as a thorough democrat. He liked 
to be called the "Citizen King," walked the streets of Paris 
The Orleans unattended, sent his sons to the public schools, 
monarchy an( j p ene d the royal palace to all who wished to 
come and shake hands with the head of the state. It soon 
became clear, however, that under an exterior of republican 
simplicity Louis Philippe had all the Bourbon itching for per- 
sonal power. A semblance of parliamentary government was 
indeed preserved, but by skillful bestowal of the numerous 
public offices and by open bribery the king managed to keep a 
subservient majority in the Chamber of Deputies. In spite 
of franchise reforms which raised the number of voters from 
about 100,000 to 200,000, the majority of citizens continued 
to be excluded from political life. The French people found 
that they had only exchanged the rule of clergy and nobles for 
that of the upper bourgeoisie. Bankers, manufacturers, mer- 
chants — the wealthy middle class — now had a monopoly of 
office and law-making. 

Few Frenchmen, outside of the bourgeoisie, supported their 
sovereign. Both the Legitimists, as the adherents of Charles X 
_. ... were called, and the Bonapartists, who wished 

Opposition ' . 

to the to restore the Napoleonic dynasty, cordially 

Orleans hated him. The Republicans, who had brought 

monarchy ^ . ' ° 

about the "July Revolution" and felt them- 
selves cheated by its outcome, held him in even greater detesta- 
tion. No less than six attempts to assassinate the "Citizen 
King" were made in the course of his reign. 

The growing discontent produced a number of plots and 
insurrections, which Louis Philippe met with the time-honored 

„ policy of repression. All societies were required 

Repressive r j r -1 

measures of to submit their constitutions to the government 

p"" 1 / 5 _ for approval. Editors of outspoken newspapers 

were jailed, fined, or banished. Criticism or 

caricature of the king in any form was forbidden. Adolphe 



The Second French Republic 



433 




434 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

Thiers, the liberal prime minister, was displaced by Guizot, a 
famous historian but a thorough reactionary. Louis Philippe, 
like his predecessor, seemed quite determined that his throne 
should not be "an empty armchair." 

Affairs did not become critical in Paris until 1848. On 
Washington's birthday of that year vast crowds assembled on 
A revolution the Place de la Concorde and clamored for Guizot's 
begun resignation. He did resign the next day, and 

the frightened king promised concessions ; but it was too late. 
Workingmen armed themselves, threw up barricades, and 
raised the ominous cry, "Long live the republic!" Louis 




Caricature of Louis Philippe 

Philippe, losing heart and fearing to lose head as well, at once 
abdicated the throne and as plain "Mr. Smith" sought an 
asylum in England. 

His abdication and departure did not save the Orleans mon- 
archy. The revolutionists in Paris proclaimed a republic and 
A republic summoned a national assembly, to be elected by 
proclaimed a ^ Frenchmen above the age of twenty-one, to 
draw up a constitution. Their action found favor in the de- 
partements, which as usual followed the lead of the capital city. 

The constitution of the second French Republic formed a 
The Constitu- thoroughly liberal document. It guaranteed com- 
tion of 1848 ^ete freedom of speech and of assembly, pro- 
hibited capital punishment for political offenses, and abolished 
all titles of nobility. There was to be a parliament of a single 
chamber, a responsible ministry, and a president chosen by 
universal manhood suffrage. This extension of the suffrage 
to include the masses marks an epoch in the history of democ- 



The " February Revolution " in Europe 435 

racy. The revolutions of 1789 and 1830 destroyed absolute 
monarchy and privileged aristocracy in France; the revolution 
of 1848 overthrew middle-class government and established 
political equality. 

The voters elected to the presidency Louis Napoleon, a 
nephew of the great emperor and the eldest representative 
of his family. During the reactionary rule of the . 
Bourbons and the dull, bourgeois monarchy of Napoleon, 
Louis Philippe, the legend l of a Napoleon who P resident of 
was at once a democrat, a soldier, and a revolu- 
tionary hero had grown apace. The stories of every peasant's 
fireside, the pictures on every cottage wall, kept his memory 
green. To the mass of the French people the name Napoleon 
stood for prosperity at home and glory abroad ; and their 
votes now swept his nephew into office. 

119. The "February Revolution" in Europe 

France had once more lighted the revolutionary torch, and 
this time eager hands took it up and carried it throughout the 
Continent. Within a few months half of the Effect of the 
monarchs of Europe were either deposed or forced "February 
to concede liberal reforms. No less than fifteen 
separate revolts marked the year 1848. Those in the Austrian 
Empire, Italy, and the German states assumed most importance. 

Vienna, the citadel of reaction, was one of the first scenes of 
a popular uprising. Mobs, which the civic guard refused to 
suppress, fired Metternich's palace and compelled Fall of 
the white-haired old minister to resign office. Mettermcn 
Quitting the capital in disguise and with a price set upon his 
head, he made his way to England, there to compare experiences 
with that other exile, Louis Philippe. Thus disappeared from 
view the man who for nearly forty years had guided the des- 
tinies of Austria, one whose name has been handed down as 
a synonym for illiberal and oppressive government. 

Metternich's fall left the radical elements in control at Vienna. 

1 Seepage 405. 



436 The Democratic Movement in Europe 



The city was ruled for a time by a revolutionary committee 
Democratic of students and citizens. The Hapsburg emperor, 
Vienna Ferdinand I, who so hated the very word "con- 

stitution" that he is said to have forbidden its use in his pres- 
ence, had to grant a constitutional charter for all his domin- 
ions, except Hungary and Lombardy-Venetia. A parliament, 





Medal in Honor of Kossuth 

Kossuth visited the United States in 1851, to secure American intervention in behalf of 
Hungary. The medal reproduced was struck off at this time. 

universal suffrage, free speech, and a free press were also 
promised by the emperor — promises which he conveniently 
ignored at the first opportunity. 

What had begun as a democratic movement among the 
Germans of Vienna speedily became a national movement 
Nationalism among other peoples of the Hapsburg realm. 
in Bohemia The Czechs of Bohemia believed that the hour 
ungary ^^ struck to regain their liberties, suppressed by 
Austria since the Thirty Years' War. They demanded a large 
measure of self-government. The Magyars also revolted and 
established an independent Hungarian Republic, with the 
patriot Kossuth as president. 

The Austrian Empire was saved from dissolution at this 
time by the bitter conflicts of its various nationalities among 
Czechs and themselves, by the loyalty of the army to the 
Magyars Hapsburg dynasty, and by foreign intervention. 

The Bohemian insurrection first collapsed. The 
Magyars, however, resisted so sternly that Francis Joseph I, 1 

1 Nephew of Ferdinand I (1835-1848). 



The " February Revolution " in Europe 437 

who had recently come to the throne, had to call in the aid of 
his brother-monarch and brother-reactionary, the tsar. Nicho- 
las I, fearing lest an independent Hungary should be followed 
by an independent Poland, joined his troops to those of the 
Austrians, and together they overwhelmed the Magyar armies. 
Kossuth escaped to Turkey. The other leaders of revolution 
perished on the gallows or before a firing squad. 

The revolutionary flood also spread over the Italian Penin- 
sula. Milan, the capital of Lombardy, expelled an Austrian 
garrison. Venice did the same and set up once Revolts in 
more the old Venetian Republic, which Napoleon Italy 
had suppressed. Charles Albert, king of Sardinia, declared 
war on hated Austria. To his aid came troops from the duchies 
of Parma, Modena, and Tuscany, from the States of the Church, 
and from the Two Sicilies. Charles Albert's proud boast, 
"Italy will do it herself," seemed likely to be justified. 

The splendid dream of a free, united Italy quickly faded 
before the realities of war. The patriotic parties would not 
act together and failed to give the king of Sardinia Sardinia 
hearty support. The pope, Pius IX, fearing a defeated 
schism in the Church, decided that he could not afford to attack 
Catholic Austria. The Bourbon ruler of the Two Sicilies also 
withdrew his troops. Sardinia, fighting alone, was no match 
for Austria. After losing the battle of No vara (1849), Charles 
Albert abdicated and went into voluntary exile. His son and 
successor, Victor Emmanuel II, made peace with Austria. 

A republic set up in Rome by the revolutionary leader, 
Mazzini, also came to grief. Pius IX, who had been deprived 
of his temporal possessions, called in the assist- The R oman 
ance of Catholic France. To the pope's appeal Republic 
Louis Napoleon lent a willing ear, since he did over rown 
not wish to allow all Italy to be subjugated by Austria. A 
French army soon expelled the republican leaders and restored 
the pope to the States of the Church. The revolution in 
Italy thus brought only disappointment to patriotic hearts. 

Almost all the German states experienced revolutionary 
disturbances during 1848. The cry rose everywhere for con- 



438 The Democratic Movement in Europe 

stitutions, parliaments, responsible ministries, a free press, and 
trial by jury. Berlin followed the example of Vienna and 
Revolution threw up barricades. Frederick William IV bowed 
in Germany before the storm. He promised a constitutional 
government for Prussia and even consented to ride in state 
through the streets of the pacified capital, wearing the black, 
red, and gold colors of the triumphant revolution. 

The German people at this time also took an important 
step toward unification. A national assembly, chosen by 
The Frank- popular vote, with one representative for every 
fort As- fifty thousand inhabitants, met at Frankfort 

y to devise a form of government for the united 

Fatherland. It was decided to establish a new federation, 
including Prussia, but excluding the non-Germanic territories 
of Austria. The learned members of the assembly had all 
the scholarship necessary for the solution of constitutional 
questions. Unfortunately, they lacked power. The revolu- 
tionary movements had not affected the armies, which, under 
their aristocratic officers, remained faithful to the princes of 
Germany. As long as the princes kept this weapon, the as- 
sembly could wield only a moral authority. I ; t might pass 
decrees, but it possessed no means of executing them. 

Though some of the members of the Frankfort Assembly 
wanted to set up a republic, the majority favored a federal 
" The great empire with a hereditary sovereign. The imperial 
refusal" fai e was offered to Frederick William IV. He 

declined it. That Prussian ruler had no desire to exchange 
his monarchy by divine right for a sovereignty resting on the 
votes of the people; he would not accept a "crown of shame" 
from the hands of a popular assembly. Moreover, he knew 
that the house of Hapsburg would never consent willingly to the 
assumption of the imperial dignity by a Hohenzollern. Prussia 
thus made "the great refusal," which destroyed the hope of 
creating by peaceful means a democratic German Empire. 

Rebuffed by Prussia and faced with the opposition of Austria, 
the Frankfort Assembly dwindled out of existence. Some of 
the more radical Germans in Saxony, Baden, and the Rhenish 



The " February Revolution " in Europe 439 

Palatinate then attempted to set up a republic by force of 
arms. Their efforts were in vain. Prussian troops Revolution 
bloodily suppressed the revolution and sealed the suppressed, 
doom of the first German Republic. 

The "February Revolution" died down in Europe, seemingly 
having accomplished little. Almost everywhere the old autoc- 
racies remained in the saddle. The Austrian significance 
constitution was revoked when Francis Joseph I, of 1848-1849 
an apt pupil of Metternich, came to the throne. The consti- 
tution which Frederick William IV granted to Prussia in 1850 
did, indeed, provide for representative government, but other- 
wise turned out to be a very illiberal document. In France, 
also, the new republic soon drifted upon the rocks of reaction. 
Discouraged by these failures, the European peoples now gave 
over to some extent the agitation for democratic reforms. 
They turned, instead, to the task of nation building. 

Studies 

1. Why is it better for a nation to make mistakes in the course of self-govern- 
ment than to be ruled, however wisely, by an irresponsible monarch? 2. "The 
nineteenth ccnturl.is precisely the history of the work which the French Revolution 
lett." Comment on this statement. 3. Mention some instances of the disregard 
of nationalism by the Congress of Vienna. 4. Why was the neutrality of Switzer- 
land guaranteed by the great powers in 1815? Has Swiss neutrality been violated 
since this time? 5. May any excuses be offered for the " shortcomings " of the 
Congress of Vienna? 6. "The name of Metternich has become a synonym for 
reaction and conservatism." Explain this statement. 7. What justification can 
be given for Mettemichismus? 8. To what extent was the Concert of Europe, as 
established in 181 5-1 8 18, a League of Peace? 9. Why has the Concert been called 
a "mutual insurance society of sovereigns"? 10. Why may the period between 
1815 and 1822 be called the era of the congresses? n. What is the meaning of 
Canning's remark, "I called the New World into existence to redress the balance 
of the Old"? 12. Who was the last divine-right ruler of France? 13. Why did 
Paris and not the provinces play the chief part in the French revolutionary out- 
breaks from 1789 to 1848? 14. Why has France been called the "magnetic pole" 
of Europe? 15. Compare the "July Revolution" in France with the "Glorious 
Revolution" in England, and Charles X with James II. 16. What precedent 
existed for the action of the powers in neutralizing Belgium? 17. Compare the 
advantages received by France from the revolution of 1848 with those received from 
the revolutions of 1830 and 1789. 18. Give reasons for the preservation of the 
Austrian Empire from dissolution in 1848-1849. 19- How was Austria the "fire- 
department" of Italy in 1821, 1830, and 1848-1840? 20. Enumerate the non- 
Germanic territories of the Hapsburgs at the middle of the nineteenth century. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE NATIONAL MOVEMENT IN EUROPE, 1848-1871 1 

120. Modern Nationalism 

Since the close of the eighteenth century, the idea of nation- 
alism has been at least as potent as that of democracy in mold- 
What is a ing modern history. What is a nation ? The 
nation? wor( j s hould not be confused with "state," which 

means the entire political community, nor with "government," 
which refers to the legislative, executive, and judicial organi- 
zation of the state. A "nation" may be defined as a people or 
group of peoples united by common ideals and common purposes. 

National feeling does not depend on identity of race, for that 
can be found nowhere. The inhabitants of every European 
The senti- country are greatly mixed in blood. It does de- 
ment of pend, in part, on sameness of speech. There 
nationality . g a j ways difficulty in uniting populations with 
different languages. The examples of bilingual Belgium and 
trilingual Switzerland show, however, that nations may exist 
without unity of language. Sameness of religion also acts as 
a unifying force; nevertheless, most modern nations include 
representatives of diverse faiths. National feeling, in fact, is 
essentially a historic product. That which makes a nation is 
a common heritage of memories of the past and hopes for the 
future. Ireland has long been joined to England, but Irish 
nationality has not disappeared. Bohemia, long subject to 
the Hapsburgs, never lost her national spirit. The Polish 
nation still lived, though after the partitions Poland disap- 
peared from the map of Europe. The Jews have been scattered 
throughout the world for many centuries, yet they continue to 

1 Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter xxxiv, "Bismarck 
and the Unification of Germany." 

440 



Modern Nationalism 441 

look forward to their reunion in the Holy Land. While national 
feeling endures, a nation cannot perish. 

Nationalism scarcely existed among the ancient Greeks, who 
made the town or the city their typical social unit. It was 
equally unfamiliar to the Romans, who created a Rise of 
world-wide state. It lay dormant throughout nationalism 
most of the Middle Ages, when feudalism was local and the 
Church and the Empire were alike international. Only toward 
the close of the medieval period did a sense of nationality arise 
in England, France, Spain, and some other countries. This 
was due to various reasons : the development of the king's 
power as opposed to that of the feudal nobles ; the growth of 
the Third Estate, or bourgeoisie, always far more national in 
their attitude than either nobility or clergy ; the rise of vernac- 
ular languages and literatures, replacing Latin in common 
use ; finally, the danger of conquest by foreigners, which greatly 
stimulated patriotic sentiments. The spread of education and 
of facilities for trade, travel, and intercourse during modern 
times made it possible for ideas of nationalism to permeate the 
masses of the people in each land. They began to feel them- 
selves closely bound together and to call themselves a nation. 

The French Revolution did most to develop this national 

sentiment. The revolutionists created the "fatherland," as 

we understand that term to-day. They substi- _ x . 

J J Nationalism 

tuted the French nation for the French kingdom ; and the 

for loyaltv to a monarch they substituted love of £ ren< : 1 \. 

J - J Revolution 

country. When an attempt was made to crush 
the Revolution, they rose as one man, and to the inspiring 
strains of the Marseillaise drove the invaders from the "sacred 
soil" of France. 

But not satisfied with defending the Revolution at home, the 
French started to spread it abroad, and in doing so became ag- 
gressive. They posed as liberators ; very speedily Napoleon and 
they proved to be subjugators. A republican natl0nalism 
general, Napoleon Bonaparte, transformed their citizen levies 
into professional soldiers devoted to his fortunes and led them 
to victory on a score of battle-fields. Napoleon, himself a man 



442 The National Movement in Europe 

without a country, felt no sympathy for nationalism. Out of 
a Europe composed of many independent and often hostile 
states, he wished to create a unified Europe after the model 
supplied by Charlemagne's empire. He even intended, had 
he been successful in the Russian campaign, to move the capi- 
tal of his dominions, and by the banks of the Tiber to revive 
the glories of imperial Rome. 

Napoleon carried all before him until he came into conflict with 
nations instead of sovereigns. The sentiment of nationalism, 
National which had saved republican France, now inspired 

resistance to the British in their long contest with the French 
emperor, spurred the Portuguese and Spaniards 
to revolt against him, and strengthened the will of Austrians, 
Prussians, and Russians never to accept a foreign despotism. 
What the Hapsburgs, Hohenzollerns, and Romanovs failed to do, 
their subjects accomplished. The national resistance to Napo- 
leon, aroused throughout the Continent, destroyed his empire. 

The reaction which followed the Congress of Vienna checked, 
but could not destroy, the national aspirations of European 
Nationalism, peoples. As we have learned in the preceding 
1815-1848 chapter, nationalism combined with all the liberal 
or democratic sentiments aroused by the French Revolution to 
provoke the revolutionary upheavals between 1815 and 1848. 
These met only partial success, but during the next twenty- 
three years nationalism won its most conspicuous triumphs in 
the unification of Italy and of Germany. 

121. Napoleon III and the Second French Empire, 1852-1870 

European history from 1848 to 1871 is dominated by the 
personality of the second French emperor, Louis Napoleon, 
Louis who influenced the fortunes of France, Italy, Ger- 

Napoleon many, Austria, and Russia almost as profoundly 
as did Napoleon Bonaparte half a century earlier. He was 
the son of Napoleon's brother Louis, at one time king of Hol- 
land, and after the death of "Napoleon II" became the recog- 
nized head of the house of Bonaparte. 1 His early life had been 

1 See the genealogical table, page 401, note 1. 




Tin. Louvre and tiii Ttjilebees, Paris 

After an old print. The palace of the Louvre was begun by Francis I in the sixteenth 
century and continued by his successors, especially Louis XIV. Important additions were 
made during the nineteenth century. The Tuileries palace, so named from the tile kilns 
(tuileriet) which once occupied the site, was burned in 187 1 . Nothing remains of the structure 
except two wings connected with the Louvre. 

44o 



444 The National Movement in Europe 

a succession of adventures. Exiled from France at the time 
of the Bourbon restoration, he found his way to many lands, 
and in Italy even became a member of a revolutionary secret 
society. Twice he tried to provoke an uprising in France 
against the Orleans monarchy and in favor of his dynasty.. 
On the first occasion he appeared at Strasbourg, wearing his 
uncle's hat, boots, and sword, but these talismans did not pre- 
vent his capture and deportation to the United States. A 
second imitation of the "return from Elba" led to his im- 
prisonment for six years in a French fortress. He then escaped 
to England and waited there, full of faith in his destiny, until 
the events of 1848 recalled him home. His election to the 
presidency of the French Republic soon followed. 

Louis Napoleon, upon becoming president of France, swore 
to remain faithful to the republic and "to regard as enemies 
An ambitious of the nation all those who may attempt by illegal 
president means to change the form of the established gov- 
ernment." Events soon showed how well the oath was kept. 
His uncle had progressed by rapid steps from the consulate to 
the empire ; he himself determined to use the presidency as a 
stepping-stone to the imperial crown. The recent adoption of 
universal manhood suffrage by the French made it necessary for 
him to enlist the support of all classes of the population. The 
army, of course, welcomed a Bonaparte at its head. The 
peasantry and bourgeoisie felt reassured when Louis Napoleon, 
far from being a radical, disclosed himself as a guardian of 
landed property and business interests. The workingmen, 
who had largely carried through the "February Revolution," 
were conciliated by the promise of special laws for their benefit. 
So skillfully did the prince -president curry favor with these 
different groups of opinion in France that it was not long before 
he attained his goal. 

The republican constitution had limited the president's term 
to four years, without the privilege of reelection. Louis Napo- 
The coup leon did not intend to retire to private life, and 
d etat, 1851 determined to carry through a coup d'etat. On 
the anniversary of the battle of Austerlitz, loyal troops occu- 



Napoleon III and the Second French Empire 445 



pied Paris, dissolved the legislature, and arrested the president's 
chief opponents. An insurrection in the streets of the capital 
was ruthlessly suppressed by the soldiers, and throughout 
France thousands of Republicans were imprisoned, exiled, or 
transported to penal colonies across the seas. The French 
people, when called upon by a plebiscite to express an opinion 
as to these proceedings, ratified them by a large majority. 
Louis Napoleon then made over the government in such a way 
as to give himself well- « 

|KP5£«T£ 



nigh absolute power. 

It needed only a change 

of name to transform 

the republic A new em _ 

into an em- peror of the 
. , French, 1852 

pire. An al- 
most unanimous popular 
vote in 1852 authorized 
the president to accept 
the title of Napoleon III, 
hereditary emperor of the 
French. 

France under Napo- 
leon III had a constitu- 
tion, univer- Dom estic 
sal manhood policy of 

~. , Napoleon III 

suffrage, and 

a legislature — all the ma- 
chinery of popular rule. 
But Fiance was free in 
appearance only. The emperor kept control of law-making, 
diplomacy, the army and navy, and the entire administra- 
tive system. France the more readily acquiesced in the loss 
of freedom because under the Second Empire she enjoyed 
material prosperity. Napoleon III felt a sincere interest in 
the welfare of all classes, including the hitherto neglected 
proletariat. By charitable gifts, endowments, and subsidies 
he tried to show that the idea of improving the lot of those who 




"France is Tranqi il" 

A cartoon, with Napoleon Ill's favorite phrase as its 
text, which appeared in Harper's Magazine. 



446 The National Movement in Europe 



are "the most numerous and the most poor" lay ever present 
in his mind. His was a government of cheap food, vast public 
works to furnish employment, and many holidays. "Emperor 
of the workmen" his admirers called him. On the other hand, 
business men profited by the remarkable development during 
this period of banks, factories, railways, canals, and steamship 
lines. The progress made was strikingly shown at the first 
Paris Exposition in 1855, when all the world flocked to the 

beautiful capital to 
see the products of 
French industry and 
art. 

Having failed to 
marry into the royal 
families of Europe, 
who looked askance 
The imperial at an ad- 
court venturer, 
Napoleon III wedded 
for love a Spanish lady, 
Eugenie de Montijo. 
Her beauty and ele- 
gance helped to make 
the court at the Tuile- 
ries such a center of 
European fashion as it had been under the Old Regime. The 
birth of an heir, the ill-fated Prince-Imperial, 1 seemed to make 
certain the perpetuation of the Napoleonic dynasty. Fortune 
had indeed smiled upon the emperor. 

"The empire means peace," Napoleon III had announced 
shortly before assuming the imperial title. Nevertheless, he 
Foreign proceeded to make war. Like his uncle, he be- 

lieved that all that the French people wanted to 
satisfy them was military glory. The emperor 
had not been two years on the throne before he embarked 




Napoleon III and Eugenie 

From a lithograph made in 1855. 



policy of 
Napoleon III 



v Killed in 1879, while fighting with the British against the Zulus in South Africa. 
The former Empress Eugenie died in 1920. 



Disunited Italy 447 

upon the Crimean War against Russia. It terminated vic- 
toriously for him in the Treaty of Paris, the most important 
diplomatic arrangement in Europe since that of Vienna. A few 
years later success still more spectacular attended his interven- 
tion in the Austro-Sardinian War for the liberation of Italy. 

122. Disunited Italy 

It might seem from a glance at the map as if Italy, with the 
Mediterranean on three sides and the Alps on the fourth, was 
specially intended by nature to be the seat of a Geography 
unified nation. But the map is deceptive. The * nd Italian 
number, position, and comparative lowness of the um y 
Alpine passes combine to make Italy fairly accessible from the 
north and northwest; from before the dawn of history these 
passes, together with the river valleys which approach them, 
have facilitated the entrance of invading peoples. The extreme 
length of the peninsula in proportion to its breadth, its division 
into two unequal parts by the Apennines, and the separateness 
of the Po basin from the rest of the country are also unfavor- 
able to Italian unity. 

Historical circumstarces have been even more unfavorable. 
The Lombards, Franks, Normans, and Germans — to say noth- 
ing of the Moslems and Byzantines — who estab- History and 
lished themselves in Italy during the Middle Ages, Italian unit ? 
divided the peninsula into small, weak, and mutually jealous 
states. In later times Spaniards, French, and Austrians an- 
nexed part of the country and governed much of the remainder 
through its petty princes. The popes also worked throughout 
the medieval and modern period to keep Italy fragmentary. 
They realized that unification meant the extinction of the States 
of the Church, or at least papal dependence on the secular 
power, and they felt that this would interfere with the im- 
partiality which the head of the Church ought to exercise 
toward Roman Catholics in all lands. Furthermore, the 
Italians themselves lacked national ideals and preserved from 
antiquity the tradition of separate city-communities, ruled, it 
may be, by despots or else self-governing, but in any case inde- 



448 The National Movement in Europe 

pendent. Such were medieval Genoa, Pisa, Milan, Florence, 

and Venice. 

Italian history, for the century and a half between the Peace 

of Westphalia and the outbreak of the French Revolution, is 

Italy before almost a blank. The glories of Renaissance art, 

the French literature, scholarship, and science were now but 
Revolution ^ . . , . . 

a memory. Centuries of misrule and internecine 

strife crushed the creative energies of the people, while their 
material welfare steadily declined after the discovery of America 
and the Cape route to the Indies shifted trade centers from the 
Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Divided, dependent, impover- 
ished, Italy had indeed fallen on evil days. 

The Italians describe their national movement as a Risorgi- 
mento, a "resurrection" of a people once the most civilized and 
Italy during prosperous in Europe. It dates from the shock of 

the revolu- foe French Revolution. The armies of revolu- 
tionary and 
Napoleonic tionary France drove out the Austrians, set up 

era republics in. the northern part of the peninsula, 

and swept away the abuses of the Old Regime. Italy began to 
rouse herself from her long torpor and to hope for unity and 
freedom. Napoleon Bonaparte, himself an Italian by birth, 
continued the unifying work of the French revolutionists. All 
Italy, except the islands of Sardinia and Sicily, was either 
annexed to France or made dependent on France. 1 Throughout 
the country the French emperor introduced personal freedom, 
religious toleration, equality before the law, and the even 
justice of the Code Napoleon. 

The year 1815 was one of cruel disappointment to patriotic 
Italians, who saw their country again dismembered, subject to 
The Austria, and under reactionary princes. 2 Men 

Carbonari w ^ i mc j once eX p er i e nced Napoleon's enlightened 
rule would not acquiesce in this restoration of the Old Regime. 
The great mass of the bourgeoisie, many of the nobles, and 
some of the better educated artisans now began to work for 
the expulsion of Austria from the peninsula and for the forma- 
tion of a constitutional government in the various states. 
1 See the map facing page 388. 2 See pages 415 and 417. 



Disunited Italy 



449 



Unable to agitate publicly, these Italians of necessity resorted 
to underground methods. A secret society, the Carbonari 
("charcoal burners"), sprang out of the Freemasons, spread 
throughout Italy, and incited the first unsuccessful revolutions 
(those of 1820-1821, 1830) against Austria. After their failure 
the society ceased to have much importance and made way for 
another revolutionary organization, Mazzini's "Young Italy." 

Giuseppe Mazzini, the prophet of modern Italy, was born at 
Genoa of a middle-class and well-to-do family. Endowed with 
all a prophet's enthusiasm and moral fervor, Mazzini and 
Mazzini from early manhood gave himself to the " Young 
regeneration of his country. He hated the Aus- a y 
trians, and he hated the princes and princelings who served 
Austria rather than Italy. 
At a time when the ob- 
stacles in the way seemed 
insuperable, he believed 
that twenty millions of 
Italians could free them- 
selves, if only they would 
sink local interests and 
jealousies in a common 
patriotism. It was Maz- 
zini's great service that 
he inspired multitudes of 
others with this belief, 
thus converting what 
had seemed a Utopia to 
his contemporaries into 
a realizable ideal. In 

183 1 Mazzini founded the secret society called "Young Italy." 
It included only men under forty, ardent, self-sacrificing men, 
who pledged themselves to serve as missionaries of liberty 
throughout Italy. Its motto was "God and the people"; its 
purpose, the creation of a republic. 

As far as practical results were concerned, "Young Italy" 
proved to be as ineffective as the Carbonari had been. Never- 




Mazzini 

After a portrait by Madame Venturl 
about 1847. 



450 The National Movement in Europe 

theless, the society kept alive the enthusiasm for Italian nation- 
alism during more than a decade. Meanwhile, other political 
Italian parties began to take shape. Many patriotic men 

parties w k ^^ no ^ f avor republican principles hoped to 

form a federation of the Italian states under the presidency of 
the pope. Many more pinned their faith to a constitutional 
monarchy under the Sardinian king. 



123. Victor Emmanuel II and Cavour 

The kingdom of Sardinia, the student will remember, in- 
cluded not only the island of that name but also Savoy and 
Sardinia and Piedmont 1 on the mainland. At the middle of 
Italian unity tne nme teenth century Sardinia ranked as the 
leading state in Italy. It was, moreover, the only Italian state 
not controlled by Austria since 1815, and in 1 848-1 849 it 
had warred bravely, though unsuccessfully, against that foreign 

power. After Pope Pius IX 
had shown himself unwilling 
to head the national move- 
ment, and after Mazzini had 
failed in his attempt to create 
a Roman Republic, Italian 
eyes turned more and more 
to Victor Emmanuel II as 
the most promising leader in 
the struggle for independence. 
Victor Emmanuel II in 
1849 mounted the throne of a 

Victor country crushed 

Emmanuel II by defeatj bur . 

dened with a heavy war 
indemnity, and without a 
The outlook was dark, but the 
new ruler faced it with resolution. Though not a man of bril- 
liant mind, he possessed much common sense and had personal 

1 Piedmont ("Foot of the Mount") extended from the Alps to the plains of Lom- 
bardy. In 181 5 Genoa had been added to Piedmont. 




Victor Emmanuel II 



place in the councils of Europe. 



Victor Emmanuel II and Cavour 451 

qualities which soon won him wide popularity. He was a de- 
voted Churchman. He was also a thorough liberal. His father 
in 1848 had granted a constitution to the Sardinians; he main- 
tained it in spite of Austrian protests, when all the other Italian 
princes relapsed into absolutism. Patriots of every type — 
Roman Catholics, republicans, and constitutionalists — could 
rally about this "Honest King," who kept his plighted word. 

Fortunately for Italy, Victor Emmanuel II had a great 
minister in the Piedmontese noble, Count Cavour. His plain, 
square face, fringed with a ragged beard, his half- Camiiio di 
closed eyes that blinked through steel-bowed spec- Cavour 
tacles, and his short, burly figure did not suggest the statesman. 
Cavour, however, was finely educated and widely traveled. He 
knew England well, admired the English system of parliamentary 
government, and felt a corresponding hatred of absolutist 
principles. Unlike the poetical and speculative Mazzini, Cavour 
had all the patience, caution, and mastery of details essential 
for successful leadership. It must be added, also, that his devo- 
tion to the cause of unification made him sometimes unscrupu- 
lous about the methods to be employed : upon occasion he 
could stoop to all the tricks of the diplomatic game. As the 
sequel will show, his "fine Italian hand " seldom lost its cunning. 

Cavour became the Sardinian premier in 1852, a position 
which he continued to fill, with but one brief interruption, until 
his death nine years later. Faithfully supported Sardinia 
by Victor Emmanuel II, Cavour bent every effort under 
to develop the economic resources of the kingdom, 
foster education, and reorganize the army. He made Sardinia 
a strong and liberal state ; strong enough to cope with Austria, 
liberal enough to attract to herself all the other states of Italy. 

Not less successful was Cavour's management of foreign 
affairs. Upon assuming office he had declared that Sardinia 
must reestablish in Europe "a position and pres- Sardinia and 
tige equal to her ambition." The Crimean War the Crimean 
gave an opportunity to do so. Though Sardinia. 
had only a remote interest in the Eastern Question, nevertheless 
she sent twenty thousand soldiers to fight with the British and 



452 The National Movement in Europe 

French against the Russians. For her reward she secured ad- 
mittance, as one of the belligerents, to the Congress of Paris, 
which ended the war. Sardinia now had an honorable place 
at the European council-table, and two powerful friends in 
Great Britain and France. 

Always practical and clear-headed, Cavour began to seek a 
military ally in the coming struggle with Austria. Public 

opinion in Great Britain sided with the Italian 
Cavour and . , , . , , 

Napoleon in patriots, but her statesmen considered them- 
selves still bound by the Vienna settlement and 
could not be relied upon for material assistance. On the other 
hand, France, under the ambitious and adventurous Napoleon 
III, held out the prospect of an alliance. The emperor seems 
to have had a genuine sympathy for Italy ; he liked to consider 
himself the champion of oppressed nationalities; and he felt 
no hesitation about tearing up the treaties of 1815, treaties 
humiliating to his dynasty and to France. In return for the 
duchy of Savoy and the port of Nice, he now promised an army 
to help expel the Austrians from Italy. 

The bargain once struck, Cavour had next to provoke the 
Austrian government into a declaration of war. It was essen- 
Q . tial that Austria be made to appear the aggressor 

between in the eyes of Europe. Cavour's agents secretly 

Austria and fomented disturbances in Lombardy and Venetia. 
Sardinia J 

Francis Joseph I, the Hapsburg emperor, in an 

outburst of reckless fury, finally sent an ultimatum to Sardinia, 

offering the choice between disarmament or instant war. Cavour 

joyfully accepted the latter. "The die is cast," he exclaimed, 

"and we have made history." 

124. United Italy, 1859-1870 

The fighting which ensued lasted only a few months. Sar- 
dinia and France carried everything before them. The allied 
Austro- victory of Magenta compelled the Austrians to 

Sardinian evacuate Milan: that of Solferino, to abandon 
War 

Lombardy. Every one now expected them to 

be driven out of Venetia as well. Napoleon III, however, 



United Italy 453 

considered that he had done enough. He had never con- 
templated the unification of all Italy, but only the annexation 
of Lombardy and Venetia to the Sardinian kingdom. The 
outburst of national feeling which accompanied the war 
promised, however, to unite the entire peninsula, thus creating 
a strong national state as a near neighbor of France. Further- 
more, Prussia, fearful lest the victories of the French in Italy 
should be followed by their advance into Germany, had begun 
to mobilize on the Rhine. For these and other reasons Napo- 
leon III decided to make an end of his Italian venture. He 
sought a personal interview with Francis Joseph I and pri- 
vately concluded the armistice of Villafranca. 

The armistice terms, as finally incorporated in the peace 
treaty, ceded Lombardy to Sardinia. Venetia, however, re- 
mained Austrian. Victor Emmanuel II and Ca- T 

Lombardy 

vour, thus left in the lurch by their ally, had to ceded to 
accept an arrangement which dashed their hopes f«5q inia ' 
just on the point of realization. Losing for once 
his habitual caution, Cavour urged that Sardinia should con- 
tinue the war alone. The king more wisely refused to imperil 
what had been already won. He would bide his time and wait. 
He did not have to wait long. 

The people of central Italy, unaided, took the next step in 
unification. Parma, Modena, Tuscany, 1 and Romagna - ex- 
pelled their rulers and declared for annexation to central Italy 
Sardinia. This action met the hearty support of annexed, 
the British government. Even Napoleon III ac- 
quiesced, after Cavour handed over to him both Savoy and 
Nice, just as if the French emperor had carried out the original 
agreement and had freed Italy "from the Alps to the Adriatic." 
An ironical diplomat described the transaction as Napoleon's 
pourboire (waiter's tip.) 

The third step in unification was taken by Giuseppe Garibaldi, 
a sailor from Nice, a soldier of liberty, and a picturesque, heroic 

1 Lucca had been incorporated in Tuscany since 1S47. 

2 The northern part of the States of the Church. Umbria and The Marches — 
also papal territories — joined Sardinia later in the year i860. 



454 



The National Movement in Europe 




Garibaldi 



figure. At the age of twenty-four Garibaldi joined "Young 
Italy," participated in an insurrection, for which he was con- 
demned to death, escaped to South America, and 
fought there many years for the freedom of the 
Portuguese and Spanish colonies. Returning to Italy during the 
uprising of 1848, he won renown in the defense of Mazzini's 
Roman Republic. The collapse of the revolutionary movement 
made him once more a fugitive; he lived for some time in New 
York ; later became the skipper of a Peruvian ship ; and finally 
settled down as a farmer on a little Italian island. The events 



United Italy 



455 



Sicilies an- 
nexed, 1860 



of 1850 called him from retirement, and he took part effectively 
in the campaign against Austria. 

When the Sicilians threw off Bourbon rule in i860, Garibaldi 
went to their aid with one thousand red-shirted volunteers. It 
seemed — it was — a foolhardy expedition, but to The Two 
Garibaldi and his "Red Shirts" all things were 
possible. Within a month they had conquered 
the entire island of Sicily. Thence they crossed to the main- 
land and soon entered 
Naples in triumph. The 
Two Sicilies voted for 
annexation to Sardinia. 
Garibaldi then handed 
over his conquests to 
Victor Emmanuel II, 
and the two liberators 
rode through the streets 
of Naples side by side, 
amid the plaudits of the 
people. 

The diplomacy of 
Cavour, the interven- 
tion of Na- Kingdom of 
poleon III, Ital y- 1861 
Garibaldi's sword, and 
the popular will thus "The Richt Leg in the Boot at Last" 

United the larger part Of A cartoon which appeared in the English journal Punch 

Italy within two years. for November «»- 186 °- 

A national parliament met at Turin in 1861 and conferred 
the Italian crown upon Victor Emmanuel II. Cavour passed 
away soon afterwards. " Let me say a prayer for you, my son," 
said a priest to the dying statesman. "Yes, father," was the 
reply, "but let us pray, too, for Italy." 

The new kingdom was not quite complete. Venice and the 
adjoining region were held by Austria. Rome and a fragment 
of the States of the Church were held by the pope. Two great 
European conflicts gave Victor Emmanuel II both of these 




456 The National Movement in Europe 

territories. Venetia fell to Italy in 1866, as her reward for 
an alliance with Prussia in the Austro-Prussian War. 1 A pleb- 
Winning of iscite of the Venetians, with only sixty-nine votes 
Venetia, 1866 re gi s tered in the negative, approved this action. 

Four years later the Franco-German War 2 broke out, com- 
pelling Napoleon III to withdraw the French garrison from 
Winning of Rome. An Italian army promptly occupied the 
Rome, 1870 c j t y ^he inhabitants, by an immense majority, 
voted for annexation to the monarchy. In 1871 the city of 
the Seven Hills, once the capital of imperial Rome, became the 
capital of the kingdom of Italy. 

Even these acquisitions did not quite round out the Italian 

kingdom. There was still an Italia Irredenta, an "Unredeemed 

" Unre- Italy." The district about Trent in the Alps (the 

deemed Trentino) and the district about Trieste at the 

Italy " 

head of the Adriatic, though largely peopled by 

Italians, remained under Austrian rule. The desire to recover 

her lost provinces was one of the reasons which led Italy in 

19 1 5 to espouse the cause of the Allies in the World War. 

125. Disunited Germany 

The political unification of Germany formed another striking 
triumph for nationalism, even though it did not involve, as in 
The German the case of Italy, the removal of a foreign yoke. 
states National unity could not be won as long as a 

motley crowd of kingdoms, duchies, principalities, and free 
cities encumbered German soil. These states — the heritage 
of feudalism — had been practically independent since the close 
of the Thirty Years' War. Each made its own laws, held its own 
court, conducted its own diplomacy, and had its own army, 
tariff, and coinage. Only a map or a series of maps on a large 
scale can do justice to the German "crazy-quilt." Here was 
a country, large, populous, and wealthy, which lacked a national 
government, such as had existed in England, France, Spain, and 
even Russia for centuries. 

1 See page 462. 2 See page 464. 



Disunited Germany 457 

The Holy Roman Empire furnished no real bond of union 

for Germany. Within the Empire were princes who also held 

territories outside. The Hohenzollerns ruled over _. _ . 

The Empire 

East Prussia and part of Poland ; the Hapsburgs, 
over Hungary and other non-Germanic lands. At the same 
time the kings of Great Britain, Denmark, and Sweden, by 
virtue of their possessions in Hanover, 1 Holstein, and western 
Pomerania, respectively, ranked among the imperial princes. 
Here was an empire which lacked a common center or capital, 
such as London, Paris, Madrid, and St. Petersburg were for 
their respective states. 

It is one of the ironies of history that Germany owes to 
Napoleon Bonaparte the first measures which made possible 
her later unification. By the Treaty of Campo N apo i eon 
Formio and subsequent treaties Napoleon secured and uni- 
for France the Germanic lands west of the Rhine, 
thus dispossessing nearly a hundred princes of their territories. 2 
He subsequently reorganized much of Germany east of the 
Rhine, with the idea of setting up a few large states as a barrier 
between France on the one side and Austria and Prussia on the 
other. 3 This work survived the emperor's downfall. Germany 
in 181 5 included only thirty-nine independent states, as com- 
pared with more than three hundred in 1789. The destruction 
of the Holy Roman Empire by Napoleon involved another breach 
with the past ; henceforth one could conceive of a new and genu- 
ine empire, thoroughly German, in which Austria had no place. 

The impulse to German nationalism also came from Napo- 
leon. By sweeping away so many small states he not only sim- 
plified the political map, but also forced Germans N apo i eon 
to abate somewhat their jealousies and hatreds and 
and to regard one another as countrymen. The 
War of Liberation against Napoleon banded them together, at 
least for the moment, in behalf of a common cause. Prussians, 

1 The king of Great Britain was the sovereign of Hanover between 1714 and 
1837. The accession of Queen Victoria at the latter date led to the separation of 
the two countries, since by Hanoverian law a woman could not occupy the throne. 

2 See page 380. 3 Sec page 398. 



458 The National Movement in Europe 

Saxons, and Bavarians rose in arms, not to seek world con- 
quests, but to free themselves from an intolerable tyranny. "I 
have only one fatherland," wrote Stein in 1812, "that is called 
Germany." The famous war song, What is the German Father- 
land f expressed the same patriotic spirit. 1 

The hopes of German nationalists were dashed by the Con- 
gress of Vienna. The Germanic Confederation, which now 
Th replaced the Holy Roman Empire, was not, 

Germanic properly speaking, a union of states, but rather of 
Confedera- sovereigns : six kings, seven grand dukes, nine 
dukes, eleven princes, and four free cities, together 
with the king of the Netherlands (for Luxemburg) and the 
king of Denmark (for Holstein). Each member of the confed- 
eration continued to be independent, except in foreign affairs, 
which a Diet, meeting at Frankfort-on-Main, controlled. The 
delegates to the Diet were all appointed by the sovereigns and 
were subject to their instructions. What little authority the 
delegates had was limited by the rule requiring a unanimous vote 
for the passage of any important measure. It is easy to see how 
under such circumstances the Diet became a synonym for 
feebleness and futility. 

Germany, while still politically divided, became economically 
one. The tariff duties levied by each member of the con- 
The federation against the goods of every other member 

Zollverein greatly hampered commerce and industry. To 
meet this difficulty Prussia formed a Zollverein (Customs Union), 
which by 1834 included eighteen states. All the others, except 
Austria, afterwards joined it. Complete free trade prevailed 
between its members, while high protective duties shut out 
foreign competition. The Zollverein showed the German 
people some of the advantages of union and encouraged them to 
look to Prussia for its attainment. The growth of the Zollverein 
coincided with the introduction of railways in Prussia and other 
states, thus binding Germany still more closely together in one 
economic system. 

1 Die Wacht am Rhein, Germany's national anthem, was not written until 1840. 
The song, Deutschland, Deutschland ilber alles, appeared a year later. 




K.= Kingdom; GR. D.^ Grand Duchy 
ELEC.= Electorate; D. = Duchy; 
REP. = Republic; P.= Principalityr 
M.-ST.=McckIenburgSlrelitz; L.-D. = Llppe- 
Detmold; S.-L.= Schaumburg-Lippo; 
H.-H.= Hessc-Homburg itoHcasc- 
DarmaUdt. 1866); O = Oldenburg; 
LBG. = Prlnclpality of Llchtcnhorg 
toCoburg until 1831); 



Longitude East lZ°_from Greenwich 



William I and Bismarck 



459 



126. William I and Bismarck 



The Prussian kingdom seemed to be, indeed, the natural 
center of unity. Her population, except the Poles, was entirely 
German ; she had led Germany in the heroic strug- p russ j a am j 
gle against Napoleon; and since 1850 she had pos- German 
sessed a constitution, which, if not democratic, um y 
at least established some measure of parliamentary government. 
The interests of Austria, on the contrary, were divided between 
her German and numerous non-German peoples, and the 
Austrian government was the apotheosis of reaction. Neither 
nationalists nor democrats could 
expect help from the Hapsburgs. 
As for the central and south- 
ern states — Saxony, Bavaria, 
Wtirtemburg, Baden, Hanover, 
and the rest — none of them was 
large enough or strong enough to 
attempt the arduous task of uni- 
fication. But if the Hohenzol- 
lerns undertook it, how would 
they carry it through? Would 
they serve Germany by merging 
Prussia in a German nation, as 
Sardinia had been merged in 
Italy, or would they rule Ger- 
many? Answers to these ques- 
tions were soon forthcoming. 

The death of Frederick William IV in 1861 called to 
the throne, at the age of sixty-four, his abler brother, 
William I. The new king had industry, conscien- 
tiousness, a thoroughly practical mind, and, what 
was still more important, the faculty of finding capable 
servants and of trusting them absolutely. A firm believer 
in divine right, he did not allow the constitution granted 
by his predecessor to interfere with the royal authority. His 
ideals, to which he steadily adhered through a long reign, 




William I 

After a photograph taken in 1862. 



460 The National Movement in Europe 

were those of the "enlightened despots" in the eighteenth 
century. 

William I was above everything a soldier. The Prussian 
mobilization at the time of the Austro-Sardinian War con- 
vinced him that the army needed strengthening, 
Army reform . . ; ° . ° 

if it was again to be, as in the days of Frederick 

the Great, the most formidable weapon in Europe. With the 
assistance of Albrecht von Roon as war minister and Helmuth 
von Moltke as chief of the general staff, the king now brought 
forward a scheme for army reform. Universal military service 
had been adopted by Prussia during the Napoleonic wars, but 
many men were never called to the colors or were allowed to 
serve for only a short time. William I proposed to enforce 
strictly the obligation to service and in this way to more than 
double the size of the standing army. 

The scheme met strenuous opposition on the part of Prussian 
liberals, who saw in it a detestable alliance between militarism 
Parlia- an( ^ autocracy. So large an army, they argued, 

mentary could only be intended to overawe the people and 

opposition st yj e ^ democratic agitation. The liberals held a 
majority in the lower house of parliament and refused to sanction 
the increased expenditures necessary for army reform. William 
I decided to abdicate if he could not be supreme in military 
matters. A deadlock ensued. It was only broken when the 
king summoned Otto von Bismarck to be his chief minister. 

The man who crippled German liberalism and created mili- 
taristic, imperial Germany belonged to the Junker class, 1 which 
otto von from the beginning had been the chief support of 

Bismarck Hohenzollern absolutism. Birth, training, and in- 
clination made him an aristocrat, an enemy of democracy, a 
foe of parliamentary government. He was born in Branden- 
burg of a wealthy country family and received his education 
at Gottingen and Berlin, acquiring, however, in these univer- 
sities a reputation for beer-drinking and dueling rather than 
for studiousness. Young Bismarck entered the Prussian parlia- 
ment and quickly became prominent as an outspoken champion 

1 See page 311. 



United Germany 461 

of divine-right monarchy. Then followed eight years of serv- 
ice as the Prussian delegate to the Frankfort Diet, where 
he gained an unrivaled insight into German politics. Appoint- 
ments as ambassador to the Russian and the French courts 
completed his diplomatic training. Such was the man, now 
forty-seven years of age, tall, powerfully built, with a mind 
no less robust than his body, who had come to the front in 
Prussia. 

Ministers, under the Prussian constitution, were neither ap- 
pointed by the parliament nor responsible to that body. It was 
therefore possible for a resolute minister, supported " Blood and 
by the king and army, to govern in defiance of the iron " 
legislature. This is what Bismarck proceeded to do. For four 
years he ruled practically as dictator. Each year, when the 
parliament refused to vote necessary supplies, Bismarck levied, 
collected, and spent taxes without an accounting to the people's 
representatives. The necessary military reforms were then 
carried out by the masterly hands of Roon and Moltke. The 
country as a whole seems to have acquiesced in this bold viola- 
tion of the constitution. Public opinion, except that of the 
liberal middle classes, reechoed Bismarck's famous and oft- 
quoted words: "Not by speeches and majority resolutions are 
the great questions of the day to be decided — that was the 
mistake of 1848 and 1849 — but by blood and iron." 

127. United Germany, 1864-1871 

Successful at home, Bismarck now turned his attention 
abroad. He and his royal master were firmly determined to 
place Prussia at the head of Germany. This Bismarck 
meant a conflict with Austria, for Bismarck's and Austria 
experience at Frankfort had convinced him that Austria would 
never willingly surrender her place in the Germanic Confedera- 
tion. From the moment of becoming chief minister he had dis- 
closed an anti-Austrian bias. He refused to admit Austria 
to the Zollverein and recognized the new Italian kingdom with 
unfriendly haste ; finally, he opposed Austrian policy in the 
so-called Schleswig-Holstein Question. 



462 The National Movement in Europe 

The duchies of Schleswig and Holstein — the one partly 
Danish and partly German in population, the other entirely 
The Schies- German — had been united to Denmark by a 
wig Holstein personal union through its ruler. They remained 
otherwise independent and stoutly resisted all 
efforts to incorporate them in the Danish kingdom. Since 
1 81 5, moreover, Holstein had been a member of the Germanic 
Confederation. Matters came to a head in 1863, when the 
sovereign of Denmark imposed a constitution upon the duchies 
which practically destroyed their independence. This action 
aroused deep resentment among German nationalists, who wished 
to have Schleswig and Holstein united with the Fatherland. 

Bismarck saw clearly what the possession of the two duchies, 
with their strategic position between the Baltic and the North 
The Danish Sea and fine harbor at Kiel, would mean for the 
War, 1864 development of German sea-power. Their annexa- 
tion was the goal which he kept steadily before his eyes. Ac- 
cordingly, he proposed joint intervention by Austria and Prussia. 
Austria assented. A brief war followed, in which the Danes 
were overcome by weight of numbers. Denmark had to sign 
a treaty ceding Schleswig and Holstein to the victors jointly. 

As Bismarck anticipated, Austria and Prussia could not 

agree concerning the disposition of the conquered duchies. 

The quarrel between them furnished a pretext for 

between the conflict which he had determined to provoke 

Austria and between the house of Hapsburg and the house of 
Prussia ..... 

Hohenzollern. Before hostilities began, his astute 

diplomacy isolated Austria from foreign support. Napoleon 
III engaged to remain neutral, on the strength of Bismarck's 
promises (never meant to be kept) of territorial " compensa- 
tions" to France from a victorious Prussia. Alexander II, the 
tsar of Russia, also preserved neutrality, as a return for Bis- 
marck's recent offer of Prussian troops to suppress an insur- 
rection of the Poles. With Italy Bismarck negotiated a treaty 
of alliance, promising her Venetia for military assistance to 
Prussia. Austria, on her side, had the support of Saxony, 
Hanover, and lesser German states. 



United Germany 463 

Thanks to the careful organization of the Prussian'army by 
Roon and to Moltke's brilliant strategy, the war turned out to 
be a "Seven Weeks' War." The Prussians at Austro- 
once took the offensive and quickly overran the Prussian 
territory of Austria's German allies. The three 
Prussian armies which invaded Bohemia crushed their Austrian 
adversaries in the great battle of Sadowa (Koniggriitz). Francis 
Joseph I then sued for peace. 

The negotiations which followed revealed Bismarck's states- 
manship. His royal master wished to enter Vienna in triumph, 
impose a heavy indemnity, and take a large slice Treaty of 
of the Hapsburg realm. Bismarck would not agree, Pra e ue 
for he did not desire to create any lasting antagonism between 
Austria and Prussia which would prevent their future alliance. 
William I finally yielded to his imperious minister and con- 
sented to bite "the sour apple" of a moderate peace. By the 
Treaty of Prague, Austria lost no territory except Venetia 
to Italy and her claims upon Schleswig-Holstein to Prussia. 
She consented, however, to the dissolution of the Germanic 
Confederation. 

Bismarck had now a free hand in Germany. His first step 

was the annexation to Prussia of the Schleswig-Holstein duchies, 

together with the kingdom of Hanover, the elec- „ . 
North 

torate of Hesse-Cassel, the duchy of Nassau, and German 

the free citv of Frankfort-on-Main. The Prus- £ onfe *!£" 

... tion. 1867 

sian dominions for the first time stretched without 

a break from Poland to the frontier of France. All the inde- 
pendent states north of the Main — twenty-one in number — 
were then required by Bismarck to enter a North German Con- 
federation, under the presidency of Prussia. The four states 
south of the Main, 1 which had thrown in their lot with Austria, 
did not enter the new confederation. They secretly agreed, 
however, to place their armies at the disposal of Prussia, in the 
event of war with France. 

For Bismarck a Franco-German War "lay in the logic of 

1 Bavaria, VVurtcmberg, Baden, and Ilessc-Darmstadt. The latter state was 
henceforth called simply Hesse. 



464 The National Movement in Europe 

history."' He believed it necessary, for joint action by the 
North German and South German states against a common foe 
Bismarck would quicken national sentiment and complete 
and France foe work of unification under Prussia. He also 
believed it inevitable, in view of the traditional French policy 
of keeping Germany disunited in order to have a weak neigh- 
bor across the Rhine. Napoleon III had now begun to regret 
his neutrality in the Austro-Prussian War and to realize that if 
German unity was to be prevented France must draw the 
sword. The emperor did not shrink from a struggle which he 
believed would satisfy French opinion and, if victorious, would 
firmly consolidate his dynasty. After 1867 both governments 
prepared for the war which both desired. 

In 1870 a single spark set the two countries aflame. A 
revolution had broken out in Spain, and the liberals there had 
The Spanish offered the crown to a cousin of William I. Na- 
incident poleon III at once informed the Prussian monarch 

that he would regard the accession of a Hohenzollern as a suffi- 
cient justification for war. William then gave way and induced 
his cousin to refuse the crown. Thereupon Napoleon went 
further and demanded William's pledge never to allow a Hohen- 
zollern to become a candidate in the future. This pledge 
William declined to make, and from the watering-place of Ems, 
where he was staying, telegraphed his decision to Bismarck at 
Berlin. After learning from Roon and Moltke of Prussia's 
complete readiness for hostilities, Bismarck sent the king's 
statement to the newspapers, not in its original form, but so 
abbreviated as to be insulting. Bismarck himself said later 
that the Ems dispatch was intended to have "the effect of a 
red flag upon the Gallic bull." Soon after receiving it, France 
declared war. 

What followed took away the breath of Europe. Fighting 
began in mid- July; by mid- August a French army under 
Franco- Bazaine was shut up in Metz ; and on September 

German War, 2 the other army, commanded bv MacMahon, was 

1870—1871 

defeated and captured at Sedan. Napoleon III 
himself became a prisoner. Bazaine surrendered Metz in Octo- 



United Germany 



465 



ber. Meanwhile, the Germans pressed forward the siege of 
Paris. It held out for four months and then capitulated (Janu- 
ary, 1 871) to cold and hunger rather than to the enemy. The 
war now ended. 

Bismarck's harsh treatment of France contrasts sharply 
with his previous moderation toward Austria. By the Treaty 
of Frankfort, France agreed to pay an indemnity Treaty of 
of one billion dollars within three years and to Frankfort 
support a German army of occupation until this sum was forth- 




lzzje 



Territory taken from France 



1871 ; restored in 1919 



Alsace-Lorraine 



coming. She also ceded to Germany Alsace, including Stras- 
bourg, and a large part of Lorraine, including Metz. These two 
fortified cities were regarded as the "gateways" to Germany. 

As far back as 1815 Prussia had tried to secure Alsace and 
Lorraine, in order to provide a more defensible frontier for her 
Rhenish possessions. 1 Bismarck took them, osten- The " Lost 
sibly to regain what had once been German terri- Provinces " 
tory, 2 but really because of their economic resources (Lorraine 
is rich in coal and iron) and their value as a barrier against 

1 See page 407. . 2 See page 299. 



466 The National Movement in Europe 



future French aggression. France could never reconcile herself 
to the loss of the two provinces; after 187 1 she always hoped 
to win them back. The majority of the inhabitants them- 
selves continued to be French 
in language and feeling, despite 
German schools, German mili- 
tary training, and a heavy Ger- 
man immigration. Alsace and 
Lorraine thus became another 
open sore on the face of Eu- 
rope. More than anything 
else, their annexation helped 
to unsettle the peace of the 
world for nearly half a century. 
Paris had not capitulated, 
the Treaty of Frankfort had 
The German not been signed, 
Empire before united Ger- 

many came into existence. 
The four South German states 
yielded to the national senti- 
ment evoked by the war and 
agreed with Prussia to enter 
the North German Confedera- 
tion, rechristened the German 
Empire. On January 18,1871, 
in the Hall of Mirrors at Ver- 
sailles, William I took the title 
of German Emperor. 
The national movement between 1848 and 1871 turned much 
of Europe upside down. Austria had been driven out of 
Europe in Italy and Germany, which were now transformed 
1871 into great unified states. Denmark had lost her 

duchies. France had lost Alsace-Lorraine. All this meant 
the end of the balance of power established in 181 5. Napoleon 
III, Cavour, and Bismarck, between them, thus destroyed 
the Vienna settlement. The national movement did not stop 




Vm Victis ! 



"Woe to the vanquished !" A cartoon by 
Sir John Tenniel which appeared in the 
English journal Punch for March ii, 1871. 
William I, in the garb of an ancient Ger- 
manic chieftain, rides his charger over the 
body of prostrate France. The Crown Prince, 
Bismarck, and other leaders appear in the 
background. 



United Germany 467 

or even lag after 1871. Combined henceforth more inextricably 
with democracy, nationalism continued to be a moving force 
in European history during the forty-three years which were 
yet to elapse before the outbreak of the World War. 

Studies 

1. Differentiate the meanings of the terms "nation," "people," "state," and 
"government." 2. "Similarity of language invites the unity of a people, but does 
not compel it." Comment on this statement. 3. "Nationalism is simply the 
tangible outward manifestation of the growth of democracy." Does this seem to 
be a defensible statement? 4. Mention some of the "submerged nationalities" 
of Europe at the middle of the nineteenth century. 5. "Nations are seldom born 
except on the field of battle." Illustrate this statement. 6. Compare the coup 
d'etat of Louis Napoleon with that of Napoleon Bonaparte. 7. Show that the 
Alps provide a less satisfactory boundary for Italy than the Pyrenees for Spain. 
8. Why has the Po Valley been called the " cockpit of Europe " ? 9. Why should 
Garibaldi, rather than Cavour, be the national herd of Italy? 10. How could Bis- 
marck justify his policy of unification through "blood and iron"? 11. Why was 
Austria excluded from unified Germany? 12. Why' did Prussia treat Austria 
mildly in 1866 and France harshly in 1871 ? 13. "The Seven Years' War may be 
looked upon as the first act of the drama that was played out at Sadowa and Sedan." 
Explain this statement. 14. What is meant by the saying that "Prussia was 
hatched from a cannon ball"? 15. Show that the German Empire, as established 
in 1 87 1, was not a continuation or restoration of the Holy Roman Empire. 16. 
Compare William I with Victor Emmanuel II and Cavour with Bismarck. 1 7. Con- 
trast the methods employed in the unification of Italy and Germany, respectively. 



CHAPTER XIV 
THE UNITED KINGDOM AND THE BRITISH EMPIRE 1 

128. Parliamentary Reform, 1832 

At the opening of the nineteenth century the people of Great 
Britain had a constitutional monarchy limited by Parliament. 
The Whig The concessions which they wrung from their 
ascendancy reluctant sovereigns in the seventeenth century 
were embodied in famous state papers, including the Petition of 
Right, the Habeas Corpus Act, and the Bill of Rights. To 
these documents of political liberty was added the Act of 
Settlement in 1701, which led, thirteen years later, to the acces- 
sion of George I, the first of the Hanoverians. He and his son 
naturally favored the Whigs, who had passed the Act of Settle- 
ment. The Whig Party included many great lords, most of 
the bishops and town clergy, the Nonconformists, and the 
merchants, shopkeepers, and other members of the middle 
class. The Tories, whose strength lay in the landed gentry 
and rural clergy, were very unpopular, being supposed to 
desire a second restoration of the Stuarts. The Whigs, in 
consequence, monopolized office during the reigns of George I 
and George II. 

Whig rule came to an end ten years after the accession of 
George III in 1760. It was the Tory ministry of Lord North 
The Tory which plunged Great Britain into the contest with 
ascendancy the T hi rtee n Colonies. William Pitt, the Younger, 
who became head of the government shortly after the fall of 
Lord North's ministry, reorganized the Tory Party. It remained 
in office during the remainder of George Ill's reign and that 
of his son and successor, George IV (1 820-1 830). 

A hundred years ago Great Britain was still an undemocratic 

1 Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 22, "Chartist Petition, 1838." 
468 



Parliamentary Reform 



469 



country. The House of Lords, composed of nobles and bishops 
who sat by hereditary right or by royal appoint- 
ment, continued to be a stronghold of aristoc- cratic Great 
racy. Even the House of Commons, the more Britain 
popular branch of Parliament, represented only a fraction 
of the British people. 

According to the representative system which had been 
fixed in medieval times, each of the counties (shires) and most 
of the towns (boroughs) of Great Britain and Ireland had two 
members in the House of Commons. Representation, however, 
bore no relation to the size of the population in either case : a 





1. England 



2. Scotland 




3. Great Britain 





4. Ireland 



The Union Jack 



Great Britain and 
Ireland 



The Act of Union with Scotland (1707) required that England and Scotland should have 
one flag made of the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew combined. After the union with 
Ireland (1801) the cross of St. Patrick was incorporated in the flag. The name "Jack" comes 
from the French Jacques, referring to James I, the fkst sovereign of Great Britain. 



47© The United Kingdom and the British Empire 



large county and a small county, a large town and a small town, 
sent the same number of representatives. Some flourishing 
The unre- P laces > such as Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, 
formed and Sheffield, which had grown up since the Mid- 

dle Ages, were without representation. Other 
places — the so-called "rotten" boroughs — con- 
tinued to enjoy representation long after they had so decayed 



House of 
Commons 



ilsaa 



»'%S y&s 









-.|^.v,;-- y .. -; j^« g 




Canvassing for Votes 

One of Hogarth's Election Prints, made in 1757. The scene is laid before an inn. The 
landlord in the middle foreground is seen contending with an officer of the Crown for the vote 
of a newly arrived farmer, who slyly takes bribes from both. 

that nothing remained of them but a single house, a green mound, 
a park, or a ruined wall. The electoral system was equally an- 
tiquated. Only landowners could vote in the counties, while 
in many of the boroughs a handful of well-to-do people alone 
exercised the franchise. Not more than five per cent of all the 
adult males in Great Britain had the right to vote. There were 
some "pocke-t" boroughs, where a rich man, generally a noble- 
man, had acquired the privilege of naming the representatives. 



Parliamentary Reform 471 

The restricted franchise in the boroughs made it easy to 

corrupt elections to the House of Commons. Bribery of 

voters reached its height under George III, who 

fostered the system in order to strengthen his and 

own authority. Not only were individual voters | ntiniid ation 
, ' ' , A ' ' ', in elections 

bribed, but "rotten" and pocket" boroughs were 

often sold outright to the highest bidder. Thanks to the custom 

of open polling, voters in the counties were particularly subject 

to intimidation by landlords, employers, and officials. The 

evils of bribery and coercion were increased in borough and 

county alike by the drunkenness and turmoil which prevailed 

during elections. 

Efforts to improve these conditions began in the eighteenth 

century, but for a long time accomplished nothing. Sober 

people, alarmed by the events in France, coupled . ., . 

,. , . , . . ' . Agitation for 

parliamentary reform with revolutionary designs parlia- 

against the government. After 1815, however, ^ntary 
the Reign of Terror and Napoleon Bonaparte were 
no longer bogeys; and public opinion grew steadily more 
hostile to a system of representation which excluded so many 
educated, prosperous members of the middle class from political 
power. Great Whig nobles also espoused the liberal cause and 
made it a party question. The Tories, on their side, stood rock- 
like against anything which savored of democracy. The duke 
of Wellington, who had become the Tory prime minister, even 
declared that nothing better than the existing system could be 
devised "by the wit of man." This obstinate refusal to make 
even the slightest concessions caused the downfall of the duke's 
ministry. In 1 830, the year of the ' ' July Revolution ' ' in France, 
the Whigs returned to office, under pledge to introduce a meas- 
ure for parliamentary reform. 

The events which followed cast much light on British methods 
of government. The Reform Bill introduced by Earl Grey, 
the Whig prime minister, failed to pass the House p assage f 
of Commons. Parliament was then dissolved, in the First 
order to test the sentiment of the country by means 
of a general election. "The bill, the whole bill, and nothing 



472 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

but the bill," cried the reforming Whigs. They triumphed, and 
another Reform Bill passed the new House of Commons by a 
large majority. The House of Lords, staunchly Tory, threw it 
out. During the next session yet a third bill was put through 
the Commons. The Lords insisted upon amendments which the 
ministry would not accept. Meanwhile, popular excitement 
rose to fever pitch, and in one mass meeting after another the 
Lords were denounced as a corrupt and selfish oligarchy. Earl 
Grey advised the king 1 to create enough Whig peers to carry 
the measure in the upper chamber. The king refused to do so ; 
the premier and his associates resigned ; and the duke of Wel- 
lington tried without success to form another Tory ministry. 
Earl Grey then resumed office, having secured the royal prom- 
ise to create the necessary peers. This extreme step was not 
taken, however, for the mere threat of it brought the Lords 
to terms. In 1832 the long-debated bill quietly became law. 

The First Reform Act achieved two results. It suppressed 
most of the "rotten" and "pocket" boroughs, thus setting 
Provisions of ^ ree a l ar g e number of seats in the House of Com- 
the First Re- mons for distribution among towns and counties 
which were either unrepresented or insufficiently 
represented. It also gave the franchise to many persons who 
owned or rented buildings in the towns or who rented land in the 
country. Workingmen and agricultural laborers — the majority 
of the population — still remained without a vote. 

The First Reform Act effected a momentous change in 
British politics. The Revolution of 1 688-1 689 had trans- 
Advent of the f erred the chief power from the sovereign to the 
middle class U pp er c lass, or landed aristocracy. 2 The par- 
liamentary revolution of 1832 shifted the balance to the middle 
class of merchants, manufacturers, and professional men — 
the Continental bourgeoisie. Henceforth for many years it 
continued to rule Great Britain. 

The events of 1832 have another significance as well. They 
proved that the Tory aristocracy, entrenched in the House of 
Lords, could not permanently defy the popular will, that "it 

1 William IV (1830-1837), a brother of George IV. 2 See page 294. 



Political Democracy 473 

was impossible for the whisper of a faction to prevail against 
the voice of a nation." The Lords yielded, however ungra- 
ciously, to public opinion. Their action meant R e f orm 
that for the future Great Britain would progress by versus « ( 
peaceful, orderly reform, rather than by revolution. 
That country is the only considerable state in Europe which 
during the past century has not undergone a revolutionary 
change of government. 

129. Political Democracy, 1832-1867 

The passage of the First Reform Act profoundly affected 
the two historic parties. The Whigs appeared henceforth as 
the particular champions of all liberal, progressive Liberals and 
measures. They soon discarded their old name Conserva- 
and began to call themselves Liberals. The Tories, 
now known as Conservatives, were in theory opposed to further 
changes, but when holding office generally went as far as their 
opponents in the direction of reform. Both parties realized that 
the time had come for Great Britain to correct old abuses and to 
modernize her institutions. 

The next thirty-five years constituted a veritable era of 
reform in almost every field. During these years Parliament 
abolished slavery throughout the British Empire, An era of 
enacted laws to reduce pauperism, passed legisla- reform 
tion ameliorating conditions of employment in factories and 
mines, modified the harshness of the criminal code, began to 
establish a system of popular education, and adopted free trade. 
Nothing was done, however, toward further extension of the 
suffrage. 

The failure of Parliament to enfranchise the masses pro- 
duced much popular discontent, and during the early years of 
Queen Victoria's reign l the movement known as 
Chartism began to make headway among work- 
ingmen. The Chartists derived their name from a charter of 
liberties which they proposed to secure. It demanded Six 

1 Victoria (1837-igoi) was the niece of George IV and William IV. 



474 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 



Points: (i) universal manhood suffrage; (2) secret voting; 
(3) equal electoral districts; (4) removal of the property- 
qualifications for membership in Parliament ; (5) payment of 
members of Parliament; and (6) annual parliamentary elec- 
tions. All but the last of these demands, which seemed so 
radical at the time, have since been granted. 

The "February Revolution" in Paris, reverberating in 
London, led to preparations for a great Chartist demonstration. 
The Chartist Six million persons, it was announced, had signed 
Petition, 1848 a petition for the Six Points, and half a million 
men, many of them armed, made ready to carry it to Parlia- 
ment. The government took alarm and put a large force of 

special constables under the 
command of the aged but still 
courageous duke of Wellington, 
to protect life and property. 
The government's firm atti- 
tude, coupled with a downpour 
of rain on the day appointed 
for the procession, dampened 
the spirits as well as the bodies 
of the Chartists, and they dis- 
persed. Their monster peti- 
tion, upon examination, was 
found to contain less than half 
the boasted number of signa- 
tures, and of these many were 
fictitious. This exposure dis- 
credited the whole Chartist 
movement. 

The collapse of Chartism did not end the agitation for a 
more democratic Great Britain. The popular movement there 
New political owed much to the outcome of the American Civil 
leaders War, which was regarded as a triumph for democ- 

racy. It began to seem anomalous that British workingmen 
should be denied the vote about to be granted negroes in the 
United States. Two great statesmen — one a Liberal and the 




Queen Victoria 

After Sir Edwin Landseer's picture of 
Victoria at the age of twenty. In Windsor 
Castle. 




475 



476 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

other a Conservative — perceived this clearly, and each became 
an advocate of further parliamentary reform. The two states- 
men were Gladstone and Disraeli. 

William Ewart Gladstone, the son of a rich Liverpool mer- 
chant of Scottish birth, had been educated at aristocratic 
Gladstone, Eton and Oxford. When only twenty-four years 
1809-1898 oldj ne en tered Parliament from a "pocket" 
borough. Gladstone's rise was rapid, for he had wealth, family 
influence, an attractive personality, wide knowledge both of 
books and of men, enormous energy, and oratorical gifts of a 
high order. All things considered, no Englishman of Glad- 
stone's generation equaled him as a public speaker. His voice, 
singularly clear and far-reaching, his eagle glance, his command 
of language, and his earnestness made him an impressive figure, 
whether in the House of Commons or on the platform. This 
"rising hope of the stern, unbending Tories," in time dis- 
appointed his political backers by joining the Liberal Party. 
It was as a Liberal that Gladstone four times became prime 
minister of Great Britain. 1 

Benjamin Disraeli belonged to a converted Jewish family of 
London. His father, a well-known author, had him educated 
Disraeli, privately. He first appeared before the public 

1804-1881 as a n0V elist, and in one book after another pro- 
ceeded to heap ridicule upon the upper classes. Entering 
Parliament as an independent radical, Disraeli's florid speech 
and eccentricities of dress — he wore bright-colored waistcoats 
and decked himself with rings — at first only provoked derision. 
Gradually, however, the young man's cleverness and courage 
overcame the prejudice against him. His own radical view- 
point altered, and before long he became a Conservative, posing 
henceforth as a staunch defender of the Crown, the Estab- 
lished Church, and the aristocracy. Disraeli proved to be an 
expert parliamentarian, always formidable in debate. For 
thirty years he absolutely dominated the Conservative Party 
and twice he realized a once "wild ambition" to be prime 
minister . 2 

1 In 1868-1874, 1880-1885, 1886, and 1802-1894. 2 In 1868 and 1874-1880. 



Political Democracy 477 

In 1866 Gladstone, then leader of the House of Commons, 
introduced a measure for franchise reform. Such old-fash- 
ioned Liberals as were opposed to further conces- p assage f 
sions to democracy combined with the Conserva- the Second 
tives to defeat the bill and overthrow the ministry. 
The Conservatives then returned to power, with Disraeli the 
real, though not the titular, chief of the party. The Conserva- 
tive ministry was even less friendly to reform than its Liberal 
predecessor, but popular demonstrations throughout the coun- 
try convinced Disraeli that an extension of the suffrage could 
no longer be delayed. He decided "to dish the Whigs" by 
granting it himself. This was done in 1867. 

The Second Reform Act gave the vote in the boroughs to all 
householders, whatever the value of their property, and to all 
lodgers who paid ten pounds or more a year for provisions of 
unfurnished rooms. By thus enfranchising work- tne Second 
ingmen, it almost doubled the electorate. The 
only considerable class still without the vote was that of the 
agricultural laborers. 

130. Political Democracy, 1867-1918 

Disraeli expected that the Second Reform Act would unite 
under the Conservative banner both aristocrats and working 
people against the great middle class represented Ballot Act, 
by the Liberals. He was disappointed. The next 1872 
election showed that the enfranchised workingmen preferred 
Gladstone's Liberal leadership. In 1872 Gladstone, who had 
now become premier, secured the passage of a bill providing 
for the secret or Australian 1 ballot, in place of open elections. 
The Ballot Act did away with the old-time corruption and 
intimidation in elections. 

During his second ministry Gladstone carried democratic 
reform still further by the passage of the Third Reform Act. 
It made the county franchise practically identical with that 
of the boroughs, thus giving the vote to agricultural laborers. 

1 First used by British colonists in Victoria, Australia, and now found in the 
United States and many other countries. 



478 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

Most Conservatives and many Liberals thought it danger- 
ous to go to such lengths. But Gladstone answered: "I take 
Third Reform my stand upon the broad principle that the en- 
Act, 1884 franchisement of capable citizens, be they few or 
be they many — and if they be many so much the better — 
is an addition to the strength of the state." 

The United Kingdom after 1884 enjoyed virtually universal 
manhood suffrage, such as had already been established in 
Agitation for France (1848), Germany (1871), and the United 
woman suf- States. But the demand for "votes for women," 
which began to be heard from about this time, 
only aroused the anger or ridicule of Liberals and Con- 
servatives alike. Nevertheless, woman suffrage organizations 
were formed, debates were held on the platform and in the 
newspapers, and equal franchise bills were introduced into 
Parliament. The movement for many years made slow progress, 
though some women received the right to vote in local elections. 

The World War gave women the vote in the United King- 
dom. Their patriotic service in the hospitals, in munition 
Equal factories, and on the farms had its reward in 1918, 

Franchise when both parties in Parliament assented to an 
Equal Franchise Act. This measure ranks in 
importance with the three acts of 1832, 1867, and 1884. It 
not only confers the franchise for the House of Commons upon 
substantially every man over twenty-one years of age in G-reat 
Britain and Ireland, but also confers it upon every woman over 
thirty years of age who has hitherto voted in local elections 
or is the wife of a local elector. There are now about sixteen 
million voters in the United Kingdom, or one in three of the 
population. 

After almost a century of gradual reform Great Britain has 
thus definitely abandoned the old theory, rooted in feudal 
Democratic conceptions, of the franchise as a privilege attached 
Great Britain to foe ownership of property, especially land. 
Voting henceforth becomes a right to be enjoyed by every 
citizen, whether man or woman. A general election for mem- 
bers of Parliament is now an appeal to a responsible people, 



Government of the United Kingdom 479 

and the will of the majority of the people must be carried out 
by Parliament. Politically, Great Britain ranks among the 
most democratic of modern countries. 

131. Government of the United Kingdom 

The written constitution of the United Kingdom of Great 
Britain and Ireland 1 consists, first, of royal charters, second, of 
parliamentary statutes, third, of the Common Law The British 
as expressed in court decisions, and fourth, of inter- constitution 
national treaties. Besides such documents, it includes a large 
mass of customs and precedents, which, though unwritten, 
are none the less binding on Crown and Parliament. The 
British constitution, easily modified and ever growing with the 
increase of law and legislation, affords a sharp contrast to that 
of the United States, which can be amended only slowly and 
with difficulty. The one is a "flexible" constitution, the other, 
a "rigid" constitution. 

As far as appearances go, the sovereign of Great Britain and 
Ireland is a divine-right monarch. Coins and proclamations 
still recite that he rules "by the grace of God" 
(dei gratia), and the opening words of the British 
national anthem are "God Save Our Lord and King." He is 
also, as far as appearances go, an absolute monarch. What- 
ever the government does, from the arrest of a criminal to the 
declaration of a war, is done in his name. But every one knows 
that the British sovereign now only acts by and with the ad- 
vice of his responsible ministers. Should George V attempt 
to revive the absolutism of James II, he would meet the fate of 
James II. 

This figurehead king occupies, nevertheless, a useful place in 
the British governmental system. As the representative of the 
nation, he often exercises a restraining, moderating Position of 
influence upon public affairs, especially through the Crown 
his consultations with politicians of both parties. He himself 
stands above party. A common loyalty to the Crown, as an 

1 Ireland by the Act of Union (effective in 1801) was joined to Great Britain to 
form the United Kingdom. 



480 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

ancient, dignified, and permanent institution, also helps to bind 
together the self-governing commonwealths of the British Em- 
pire. It is a symbol of imperial unity such as could scarcely be 
afforded by an elective and constantly changing Presidency. 
The rising tide of republicanism has thus failed to affect the 
British monarchy, and the personal popularity of Queen Victoria, 
Edward VII, and George V seems to have established it more 
solidly than a century ago in the esteem of their subjects. 

British legal theory makes Parliament consist of the Crown, 
the House of Lords, and the House of Commons. The share 
of the Crown is now limited to expressing assent to 
a bill after its passage by the Commons and the 
Lords. Such assent the king must give. The royal veto has 
not been expressly taken away, but Queen Anne in 1707 was 
the last sovereign to exercise this former prerogative. Nor may 
the courts set aside an act of Parliament as unconstitutional, for 
every statute is a part of the constitution. An American 
student, accustomed to the water-tight division of powers be- 
tween President, Congress, and the federal courts, finds it hard 
to appreciate the legal omnipotence of the British Parliament. 
The only check upon it is the political good sense of the British 
people. 

The House of Lords contains upwards of seven hundred 
members: the Lords Spiritual (archbishops and bishops) and 
House the Lords Temporal (princes of the royal blood, 

of Lords 1 a n_ English peers, and a certain number of Scotch 
and Irish peers). There are also four law lords, who, with the 
Lord Chancellor, form the highest court of appeal for certain 
cases. The Lord Chancellor presides over the House of Lords. 
The power to create new peers belongs to the Crown, but 
usually the prime minister decides who shall be selected for this 
honor. Distinction in any field is frequently recognized by the 
grant of a peerage. Lawyers, authors, artists, scientists, and 
generals rub shoulders with gentlemen landlords, capitalists, and 
politicians on the floor of the House of Lords. 

The House of Lords was the dominant chamber until the pas- 
sage of the First Reform Act. Since then it has been understood 



482 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

that the Lords might not oppose the Commons on any measure 
supported by a majority of the electorate. This purely con- 
Parliament ventional restriction was written into the consti- 
Act, 1911 tution by the Parliament Act of 191 1. The 

Lords agreed to it only when confronted, as in 1832, with the 
prospect of being "swamped" by a large number of newly 
created Liberal peers. The Parliament Act deprives the upper 
chamber of all control of money bills, that is, bills levying taxes 
or making appropriations. Such measures become laws one 
month after being sent from the Commons to the Lords, whether 
accepted by the latter or not. The act further provides that 
every other bill, passed by the Commons in three successive 
sessions (extending over two years at least) and rejected by the 
Lords at each of the three sessions, shall become law. The 
House of Lords is thus left with only a "suspensive veto" of 
legislation. 

The hereditary House of Lords is so frankly an anachronism 
in democratic Great Britain that from time to time various pro- 
Position of posals have been made for its " mending or ending." 
the House Many reformers would like to see it become an elec- 
tive upper chamber like the French and Ameri- 
can Senates. Some radicals would abolish the House of Lords 
altogether, thus doing away with the bicameral system. There 
seems reason to believe, however, that in one form or another 
it will survive for many years. Birth and family still count 
for much in British society, and the average citizen retains a 
profound respect for the aristocracy. 

The House of Commons consists of seven hundred and seven 
members, chosen by universal suffrage from equal electoral 
The House districts in Great Britain and in Ireland. Com- 
of Commons moners se rve for five years, which is the maximum 
life of a single Parliament. This period is curtailed whenever 
the Crown, on the advice of its ministers, dissolves the House of 
Commons and orders a new general election. Voting does 
not take place on one day throughout the United Kingdom; 
it may extend over as much as two weeks. Nor need a candidate 
be a resident of the district which he proposes to represent. 




CHOIR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY 

The church formerly attached to the Benedictine abbey of St. Peter in Westminster 
was built in the 13th century, upon the site of an earlier church raised by Edward the 
Confessor in the nth century. Since the Norman Conquest all but one of the English sov- 
ereigns have been crowned here, and until the time of George III, it served as their last rest- 
ing place. The abbey is now England's Hall of Fame, where many of her distinguished 
statesmen, warriors, poets, artists, and scientists are buried. 



Government of the United Kingdom 483 




Defeat in one constituency, therefore, does not 
necessarily exclude a man from Parliament ; he 
may always "stand" for another constituency. 
Prominent politicians, as a rule, retain seats in 
the House of Commons year after year. The 
property qualification for members of the House 
of Commons has been abolished, and since 191 1 
they have received salaries. 

Parliament works through a committee known 
as the cabinet. 1 This body, which developed 
during the eighteenth century, The cabinet 
exists purely by custom and has 
no place whatever in the written constitution of 
the United Kingdom. The cabinet usually 
includes about twenty commoners and lords, 
who belong to the party in power. During the 
World War, however, a "coalition" cabinet, 
representing both parties carried on the govern- 
ment. Members of the cabinet are selected 
by a caucus of the majority party in Parlia- 
ment, always, of course, with the approval of 
the prime minister, who is the recognized leader 
of the party. The cabinet acts together in all 
matters, thus presenting a united front to Parlia- 
ment and the country. 

The cabinet shapes legislation, determines 
policy, and administers the laws. In secret 
sessions it drafts the more im- Cabinet 
portant measures to be laid before g° vernment 
the House of Commons. That body may amend 
bills thus presented to it, but amendments 
are usually few and unimportant. Should a 
cabinet measure fail to pass the Commons, 
or should the Commons vote a resolution of "no confidence," 




House of Com- 
mons Mace 



1 The terms "cabinet" and "ministry" are used interchangeably. The minis- 
try, however, contains a large number of administrative officers who do not attend 
cabinet meetings. 



484 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 



Public 
opinion and 
the cabinet 



custom requires the cabinet to resign or "go to the country." 
In the former case, the king "sends for" the leader of the 
opposite party and invites him to form a cabinet which will 
have the support of the Commons. In the latter case, the king 
dissolves Parliament and calls a general election. The return 
of a majority favorable to the cabinet permits it to remain in 
office ; otherwise the prime minister and his associates give way 

to a cabinet formed by 
the Opposition. 

However powerful, 
the cabinet is not an 
irresponsible oligarchy. 
Public opinion prevails 
in Great 
Britain as 
in other 
democratic countries. 
Proposals for new legis- 
lation, as a rule, are 
thoroughly discussed in 
newspapers and on the 
platform before and 
after their submission 
by the cabinet to the 
House of Commons. 
No cabinet would think of backing a measure which in its judg- 
ment was not favored by the great body of the electorate. As 
has been noted, general elections must be held at least every 
five years and may be held at any time in order to secure an 
expression of the popular will. Furthermore, a defeat at a 
general election or a defeat or vote of censure in the House 
of Commons is not always necessary for the downfall of a 
cabinet. The prime minister sometimes resigns office even 
when he retains a majority in the Commons, if he feels that 
his policies are no longer acceptable to the country at large. 
Public opinion thus affects all legislative measures and deter- 
mines the rise and fall of cabinets. 




No. 10, Downing Street 

The larger of the two houses here shown is the official 
residence of the British prime minister. It faces a little 
street opening into Whitehall and near the Parliament 
buildings. 



The Irish Question 485 

The Liberals and Conservatives continue to control Parlia- 
ment in the twentieth as in the nineteenth century. The last 
general election (December, 1918) returned a large Political 
number of Laborites, some of them trade unionists parties 
and others socialists. From the middle 'eighties the Irish 
Nationalists, who advocated Home Rule for Ireland, formed an 
important minority party, usually in alliance with the Liberals. 
In the last election, however, the Nationalists were swallowed by 
the Sinn Feiners, whose program is a completely independent 

Ireland. 

132. The Irish Question 

The English entered Ireland during the reign of Henry II 
in the twelfth century. They first occupied the region around 
Dublin, which received the name of the Pale. The English 
Later sovereigns, especially Henry VIII and in Ireland 
Queen Elizabeth, extended English dominion throughout the 
island and sought to Anglicize it by introducing the English 
language, the Common Law, and the Anglican Church. The 
Irish, however, would not give up their own Celtic speech, their 
'tribal customs, and their Roman Catholic faith. Ireland con- 
stantly seethed with rebellion, and it required the iron hand of 
Oliver Cromwell to bring peace to the distracted country. ■ At 
the time of the "Glorious Revolution" the Roman Catholic 
Irish espoused the side of James II, but William of Orange 
(William III) completely defeated James II at the battle of the 
Boyne in 1690. For the next century Ireland remained quies- 
cent under alien rule. 

The government of England in its efforts to subdue Ireland 
early adopted the policy of colonizing parts of it with immi- 
grants, who would be more tractable than the Land con- 
natives. Early in the reign of James I Protestant fiscations 
Scotch and English were settled in the province of Ulster, where 
they received ample estates and privileges. After Cromwell's 
pacification of Ireland, other "plantations" of Englishmen 
took place in Leinster and Munster. William III subsequently 
rewarded his adherents by granting them more than a million 
acres of Irish soil. 



486 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 



l !;j<>\ The English Pale (Time of Henry VIII) 

~\ The English Pale (Time of Charles I) 
Plantations of English and Scots 
(Time of Elizabeth and the first two Stuarts) . 




Ireland 

These confiscations gave rise to an acute agrarian problem in 
Ireland. Much of the country belonged to the heirs and suc- 
Absentee cessors of the Englishmen who had received Irish 
landlordism estat es. They usually lived in England, seldom 
or never visited Ireland, and took no interest in the welfare 
of the Irish tenantry. The management of their property 
was left to hard-hearted agents, who seized every opportunity 
to raise the rents of tenants. 

Such opportunities constantly arose. There were few ways 



The Irish Question 487 

of earning a living in Ireland except from the soil, and keen 
competition among the peasantry for farms forced up rentals 
to an exorbitant amount. The landlord, as a " Rack- 
rule, received everything above a bare subsistence rentin s 
for the tenant and his family. "Rack-renting" increased the 
misery of the peasants. All improvements on a farm had to 
be made by the tenant, but if he made them his rent was im- 
mediately raised. Refusal to pay it meant eviction from his 
cottage home. No wonder that under this system the soil was 
wretchedly cultivated. 

Year after year Irish peasants sank deeper in poverty. The 
high rents and the scanty yield of the ill-used soil kept them 
constantly on the verge of starvation. They did The Potato 
starve whenever there was a failure of the potato Famine 
crop, on which they chiefly relied for food. 1 Conditions were 
worst during the Potato Famine of 1 846-1 847. Eighty thousand 
persons, it is estimated, perished at this time, in spite of charity 
and government aid. The survivors emigrated in great numbers 
to America. Within four years the population of the country 
decreased by more than a million. The decline continued to 
the end of the nineteenth century, until Ireland had lost by 
mortality and emigration half of its people. 

Many years elapsed before the British government made a 
resolute attempt to remedy agrarian distress in Ireland. Glad- 
stone's Land Act in 1881 marks the first con- Land 
structive legislation to meet the Irish demand le g lslatl0n 
for the three " F's" — fair rent (a rent fixed by public authority 
instead of by competition) , fixity of tenure (the right of a peasant 
to hold his land as long as he paid rent) , and free sale (his right 
to sell to his successor any improvements made by him). The 
Land Purchase Acts, passed by the Conservative Party in 1891 
and 1903, create a state fund from which tenants may borrow 
money on easy terms to buy their holdings. Thousands of Irish- 
men have already availed themselves of this opportunity to get 
rid of the hated landlords and become independent proprietors. 
The agrarian problem in Ireland bids fair soon to be solved. 

1 The potato had been introduced into Ireland from America. 



488 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

The religious problem has already been solved. Ireland, it 
will be remembered, did not become Protestant at the time of 
Disestablish- the Reformation, and to this day three-fourths of 
ment, 1869 ^ population remain attached to the Roman 
Catholic faith. Nevertheless, Irish Catholics had to pay 
tithes for the support of the Anglican Church in Ireland, until 
after the middle of the nineteenth century. Gladstone's first 
ministry removed this grievance by disestablishing the Angli- 
can Church in Ireland. Disestablishment meant that Ireland 
would no longer have a state church to which all the people, 
irrespective of their religious beliefs, were obliged to contribute. 

The third problem is that of Home Rule. After the Act of 

Union in 1801, Ireland continued to be governed by the British 

__. „ , Parliament, in which the English and Scots hold an 
Home Rule ... 

overwhelming majority. Irishmen objected to this 

arrangement and demanded the restoration of the former Irish 
Parliament, which sat in Dublin. The first leader of the Home 
Rule agitation was the celebrated orator and patriot, Daniel 
O'Connell. His failure to secure by constitutional means the 
repeal of the Act of Union led to the formation of a Young 
Ireland Party, which unsuccessfully imitated the Continental 
revolutions of 1848. 

During the 'seventies and 'eighties of the last century the 
cause of Home Rule found its ablest advocate in Charles Stewart 
Home Rule Parnell. He was a landlord and a Protestant, 
bllls but nevertheless won the enthusiastic support of 

all Irish patriots. Parnell took the leadership of the Irish 
Nationalists, a political party devoted to Home Rule. When 
Gladstone entered upon his third ministry in 1886, the Nation- 
alists were numerous enough to hold the balance of power in 
the House of Commons. Gladstone could only secure their 
support by introducing a Home Rule Bill. So bitter was the 
opposition to it that nearly a hundred Liberals deserted their 
party and joined the Conservatives, thus defeating the measure. 
In 1893 the " Grand Old Man," now premier for the fourth time, 
brought in his second Home Rule Bill. It passed the Commons 
but met defeat in the Lords. Mr. Asquith's Liberal ministry 



The Irish Question 489 

subsequently introduced a third Home Rule Bill. Having 
thrice passed the House of Commons, it became a law in 1914, 
notwithstanding its rejection by the House of Lords. The 
outbreak of the World War, however, suspended the operation 
of the measure. It proved to be so unpopular with all classes 
of Irishmen that in 1920 Mr. Lloyd George secured the enact- 
ment of still another Home Rule Bill. It provides for the crea- 
tion of two legislative bodies, one in the north of Ireland (Ul- 
ster) and one in the south, with a council selected by the two 
legislatures to form a connecting link between them. They 
are to control all local matters and most of the administrative 
machinery except the army and navy, and are to have extensive 
powers over taxation. The two legislatures may at any time 
agree to combine into a single legislature for all Ireland. After 
this Home Rule Bill becomes effective, the representation of 
Ireland in the British Parliament at Westminster will be 
reduced to forty-two members. 

Meanwhile, an agitation in favor of complete independence 
has made rapid progress everywhere in Ireland except in 
Ulster. It owes much to a group of quiet scholars, The 
who devoted themselves to the revival of Irish liter- Sinn Fein 
ature, the old Irish language (Erse), and the sentiment of Irish 
nationality. This national movement gave birth to the Sinn 
Fein 1 Party. The members insist upon the entire separation of 
Ireland from Great Britain. In the spring of 1916 they allied 
themselves with radical workingmen of Dublin, and proclaimed 
an Irish Republic. British troops put down the insurrection and 
executed some of its leaders. Though the Sinn Feiners secured 
nearly all the Irish representation in Parliament at the last 
general election, they refused to take their seats at Westminster. 
Members of the organization entered in 192 1 upon negotiations 
with Great Britain in the effort to secure for Ireland, if not 
complete freedom, at least complete self-government. 

Britishers believe that some form of political union between 
Ireland and Great Britain is essential to their own safety. An 
independent Ireland, it is argued, would be the prey of the first 

1 Irish for "Ourselves alone." 



490 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

great power to quarrel with her or the tool of the first to quarrel 
with Great Britain. In either case the British people would be 
The case for gravely imperiled, for Ireland commands the most 
Great Britain important sea routes over which come the food- 
stuffs and raw materials indispensable to their existence. This 
is the principal reason why forty-four million Britishers con- 
tinue to deny political sovereignty to four million Irishmen. 

133. The British Empire 

The United Kingdom is the cradle and present center of the 
British Empire. That empire is of comparatively recent 
Growth of formation. In 1603, at the accession of James I, 
the empire England did not possess a mile of foreign territory, 
excepting the Channel Islands. Since then imperial expansion 
has gone on in India, Africa, Australia, North America, and the 
islands of the seas, until now the Union Jack floats over a 
quarter of the land surface of the globe. 

The British Empire, unlike most of the great empires of the 
Sea-power past, does not stretch continuously on land. Its 
-nd the territorial possessions are found in every conti- 

nent. Its trade routes and lines of communication 
by steamship and submarine cable lie across thousands of miles 
of water. Without sea-power, the empire would speedily 
break into fragments, some becoming independent countries 
and others being annexed by their stronger neighbors. 

Sea-power depends primarily on superiority of naval force, 
which the British secured by their maritime warfare with the 
The British Dutch and French in the seventeenth, eighteenth, 
navy and nineteenth centuries. The World War, re- 

sulting in the capture or destruction of most of the German 
fleet, has confirmed Great Britain's position as mistress of the 
seas. This position she intends to keep. It is her declared 
purpose to maintain a navy at least as strong as any two foreign 
navies. A smaller margin of strength, the British people be- 
lieve, would endanger the safety of their empire. 

Sea-power is also dependent to some degree upon the existence 
of naval bases, where warships may obtain coal and other 



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492 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

supplies. Great Britain has them at convenient intervals on 
nearly all the great trade routes. Gibraltar, Malta, and Cyprus 
British naval give her control of the Mediterranean. Suez, 
bases Aden, and various islands in the Indian Ocean 

guard the shortest route to India and Australia. In the Far 
East she has Singapore, Hongkong, Weihaiwei, and other 
important ports. Her African stations include the islands of 
Ascension, St. Helena, Mauritius, and Seychelles. In American 
waters the Bermudas and the British West Indies provide 
stations for military and commercial purposes, all the more 
valuable since the completion of the Panama Canal. These 
naval bases are the real sea-links of the empire. 

The population of the British Empire, excluding the United 
Kingdom, is estimated at 400,000,000. Of these, about 20,- 
" Colonials " 000 j 00 ° are "colonials," the descendants of Eng- 
and ^ Hsh, French, Dutch, and Spanish immigrants. The 
other inhabitants are "natives" — a comprehen- 
sive term to include the peoples of India, together with Malays, 
Chinese, Polynesians, Arabs, negroes, and American Indians. 
All the races of man, all stages of culture from savagery to 
civilization, all the principal religions, and nearly all the principal 
languages, of mankind are represented in the British possessions. 

The word empire usually suggests the autocratic rule of 
conquerors over subjects. Autocracy indeed exists in the 
British im- British Empire, for the "natives," who comprise 
perialism nineteen-twentieths of the population, have as yet 
little or no voice in the management of their own concerns. On 
the whole, Great Britain rules them wisely, justly, even benevo- 
lently. She maintains peace — the Pax Britannica — keeps 
domestic order, abolishes such evil customs as slavery, can- 
nibalism, and human sacrifice, introduces systems of education 
and sanitation, and spends large sums for the development of 
the natural resources of each possession. More and more it 
becomes the conscious purpose of Great Britain to train the 
more advanced of her native subjects in democracy, so that they 
may ultimately take a place among the great self-governing 
peoples of the empire. 



The British Empire 493 

As respects government, India stands by itself. British 
India, which includes two-thirds of the area of the country and 
three-fourths of the population, is ruled directly 
from London through a cabinet officer called the 
Secretary of State for India. The actual administration rests 
in the hands of an appointive viceroy, assisted by two coun- 
cils and the officials of the Indian Civil Service. The re- 
mainder of India consists of native or feudatory states, about 
six hundred in number. These continue to be ruled by their 
own princes, under the oversight and protection of Great Britain. 

Besides the feudatory states of India, Great Britain has sev- 
eral protectorates, chiefly in Africa. She also Protector _ 
possesses certain spheres of influence in Africa ates and 
and other parts of the world, where foreign coun- {^g® s ° f 
tries agree not to acquire territory or control, either 
by treaty or by annexation. 

In the seventeenth century trading companies chartered by 
the Crown established nearly all the American colonies of 
Great Britain and laid the foundation of her Chartered 
Indian dominions. In the nineteenth century com P anies 
similar chartered trading companies carried the British flag 
into the interior of Africa and among the islands of the Pacific. 
The British South Africa Company, organized by Cecil Rhodes, 
still controls the vast tract of territory called Rhodesia. Sim- 
ilarly, the British North Borneo Company governs North 
Borneo, though this country has now been declared a protec- 
torate. 

The most numerous group of British possessions is composed 
of the Crown colonies. They are all under governors appointed 
by the Crown. In a few Crown colonies the Crown 
governor exercises entire authority, both legis- colonies 
lative and executive ; in the others he is assisted by councils 
which are sometimes nominated by the Crown and sometimes 
selected by the colonists. The Crown colonies lie chiefly within 
the tropics and contain relatively few English-speaking inhabit- 
ants. Examples are the British West Indies, British Guiana, 
Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Ceylon, and the Straits Settlements. 



494 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

The group of self-governing colonies, or Dominions, is small 
in number, but it includes Canada, Newfoundland, Australia, 
Self-govern- New Zealand, and South Africa. Their govern- 
ing colonies ment c i sely parallels that of the United Kingdom. 
In each colony the Crown is represented by a governor or gover- 
nor-general ; the House of Lords, by an upper chamber ; and 
the House of Commons, by a popularly elected assembly. 
Each one has also a prime minister and the cabinet system. 
Great Britain controls the foreign relations of these five colonies, 
but otherwise allows them practically complete independence in 
matters of legislation. Without interference, they tax them- 
selves, impose tariff duties, even on British goods, control im- 
migration, raise their own armies, support their own navies, 
and have their own national flags. They are, in fact, "colonial 
nations." 

The nineteenth century was well advanced before Great 
Britain learned the right policy to adopt toward the "colonials" 
British colo- in North America, Australasia, and South Africa, 
nial policy ^g r j s i n g s [^ e f democratic sentiment, as seen in 
the reform of parliamentary representation, more than any- 
thing else stirred the British people to extend full rights to 
their colonies. Political emancipation at home had a natural 
result in political emancipation abroad. Canada first received 
self-government in the 'forties of the last century, and since then 
Great Britain has cordially bestowed the same precious gift 
upon her Australasian and South African dominions. Though 
virtually independent, they continue to enjoy the protection of 
the British Empire and to share in its glory. 

This change of British colonial policy, which has converted 
so much of the empire into a commonwealth of free states, is 
Greater one of the outstanding facts of modern history. 

Britain ^he vast ex tent of the Dominions, their enormous 

resources, and their rapidly growing population give promise of 
unlimited development in the future. They form a Greater 
Britain for the perpetuation through the ages of the language, 
laws, and institutions of the mother country. 

The British Empire, as at present constituted, is a complex 




Longitude 120 East from 150 Greenwich 



Longitude 150° West from 



Greenwic! 




it s,:#. 



495 



496 The United Kingdom and the British Empire 

and apparently inharmonious organization of protectorates, 
Crown colonies, self-governing Dominions, and Indian states. 
Imperial The empire lacks a central body representing all 

federation j ts m embers an d capable of united action. Steps 
in the direction of closer union have been taken by means 
of imperial conferences. The first was held at London in 1887, 
on the occasion of Queen Victoria's Jubilee celebration of the 
fiftieth anniversary of her accession to the throne, and was at- 
tended by representatives of the Dominions. Representatives 
of India also appeared at the last conference in 191 7. Naval 
and military defense, tariffs, and other matters of common con- 
cern are discussed at these periodical gatherings. They make, 
therefore, for a better understanding between Great Britain and 
her dependencies. Further steps toward uniting the British Em- 
pire will doubtless be taken in the future. 

But the machinery of federation is a secondary matter, as 
long as the British Empire is one in spirit. The defects of its 
Imperial body are compensated for by the unity of its soul. 

umty The real strength of the bends between Great 

Britain and her children overseas was first shown during the 
Boer War of 1899, when they rallied loyally to her support. 
During the World War both "colonials" and "natives" made 
huge contributions in money, food, ships, and men to Great 
Britain in her hour of need. The British Empire, in the words 
of Edmund Burke, is held together "by the close affection which 
grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar 
privileges, and equal protection. These are ties, which, though 
light as air, are as strong as links of iron." 

Studies 

1. Distinguish between England, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, and the 
British Empire. 2. Show that the British constitution is of the "flexible" type, 
while that of the United States is of the "rigid" type. 3. Explain the royal, aris- 
tocratic, and democratic elements, respectively, in the British system of government. 
4. Show that in Great Britain "the king reigns, but does not govern." 5. Why 
is the British government sometimes called a "crowned republic"? 6. Contrast 
the unlimited powers of the British Parliament with the limited powers of the Amer- 
ican Congress. 7. Why has the House of Lords been called "the Westminster 
Abbey of living celebrities"? 8. Mention some noteworthy differences between 



The British Empire 497 

the British cabinet and the American cabinet, g. How does the British system 
of government represent a "union of powers," as contrasted with the American 
system of a "separation of powers"? 10. "The Irish Question is the Achilles' 
heel of the British Empire." What does this statement mean? n. On the map 
between pages 494 and 4g5, locate the self-governing colonies, the more important 
Crown colonies, the chartered companies, and the protectorates of the British Em- 
pire. 12. "Doubtless the most significant and momentous fact of modern his- 
tory is the wide diffusion of the English race, the sweep of its commerce, the domi- 
nance of its institutions, its imperial control of the destinies of half the globe." 
Comment on this statement. 



CHAPTER XV 
THE CONTINENTAL COUNTRIES 

134. The Third French Republic 

The third French Republic arose in the midst of war. Two 
days after the battle of Sedan, upon the receipt of a dispatch 
The republic from Napoleon III announcing his army captured 
proclaimed and hi mse if a prisoner, Paris broke out in revolt. 
The empress Eugenie fled with her son to England, and the 
absent emperor was deposed as being responsible for the "ruin, 
invasion, and dismemberment of the country." The revolu- 
tionists then set up a provisional government, republican in 
character. Similar action was taken independently in Lyons, 
Marseilles, Bordeaux, and other provincial cities. Paris in 
1870 did not impose a republic upon the rest of the country ; 
much of urban France declared spontaneously for it: The 
fact is important, as helping to explain why the Third Republic 
has lasted so much longer than its predecessors. 

The provisional government undertook the task of driving 
the Germans from French soil. Gambetta, the most prominent 
Peace Republican leader, escaped from Paris in a balloon, 

made with roused the fighting spirit of the French people by 
his eloquence, and carried on for several months a 
brave but futile struggle against the German enemy. Equally 
futile were the diplomatic missions which Thiers 1 made to one 
European court after another, to enlist foreign aid for France. 
Paris could not be saved. After the fall of the capital a National 
Assembly ratified the humiliating Treaty of Frankfort 2 with 
Germany. 

Peace had not been made before France was called upon to 
endure the agonies of a civil conflict. The Commune, 3 or 

1 See page 434 2 gee page 465. 3 See page 375. 



The Third French Republic 499 

municipal council, of Paris fell into the hands of radical Re- 
publicans, socialists, and anarchists, who raised the red flag. 
They set up an independent government in the -phe " com- 
capital and even proposed to divide all France into munards " 

^UDorcsscd 

a loose confederation of self-governing communes. 

The French people this time did not accept a revolution made 

in Paris. Loyal troops laid siege to the city, entered it after 

hard fighting, forced their way through the barricades, and 

suppressed the insurrection. The events of this " Bloody Week," 

like those of the Reign of Terror, fill a lurid page in French 

history. 

The National Assembly in 1871 chose Thiers as "President 
of the Republic." Nevertheless, several years elapsed before 
France became republican in much more than The Con _ 
name. ' Two-thirds of the members of the National stitution of 

1875 

Assembly were really attached to monarchical 
principles. They soon forced Thiers to resign in favor of Mar- 
shal MacMahon, 1 who was to make way for a king as soon as 
one should be chosen. The monarchists, however, could not 
agree upon a satisfactory candidate for the throne. This 
situation played into the hands of Gambetta, who made it his 
mission to spread republican ideas among conservative French- 
men. The result was that in 1875 France adopted a republican 
constitution. 

The Constitution of 1875 established a parliamentary form 
of government, which resembles that of the United Kingdom. 
Legislative authority is vested in a Chamber of The 
Deputies and a Senate. The two houses have le s islature 
substantially equal powers in introducing and amending bills, 
except money bills, which must emanate from the Chamber 
of Deputies. The Senate has less importance than the Chamber 
of Deputies, because the premier and his associates in the 
ministry are responsible to the latter body. The two chambers, 
meeting together, may revise the constitution at any time. 

Executive authority is nominally vested in a president, who 
holds office for seven years. He may be reelected, but this 
1 See page 464. 



i ..'.'' - : -.; . .-._ , 




Notre Dame, Paris 

The present structure, begun in 1163 and completed about 1240, suffered severely during 
the French Revolution, when it was converted into a Temple of Reason. Extensive reno- 
vations and alterations were made during the nineteenth century. Two massive square 
towers, originally intended to support spires, crown the principal or western facade. Its 
three doors are surrounded by elaborate sculptures and surmounted by a row of figures repre- 
senting twenty-eight kings of Israel and Judah. Above the central door is a rose window 
of stained glass and above this a graceful gallery of pointed arches supported on slender 
columns. The rood-spire is a modern restoration. 



The Third French Republic 501 

has happened only once. In order to prevent the rise of 
some future Louis Napoleon through popular election, the con- 
stitution prescribes that the president shall be The 
chosen by a majority vote of the two branches of P resident 
the legislature in joint session at Versailles. Any citizen, except 
a member of a French royal or imperial family, may offer 
himself for the presidency. The successful candidate is usually 
a prominent senator or deputy. Whenever the presidential 
office becomes vacant by the death or resignation of the in- 
cumbent, his successor must be immediately chosen for the full 
term. Like the British sovereign, the French president is 
largely a figurehead. He sends messages to parliament, re- 
ceives foreign visitors, and presides at public functions, but 
his powers are very limited. The constitution provides 
that every presidential act shall be countersigned by some 
minister, who thereby assumes responsibility for it. When a 
change of ministry occurs, the president chooses a leading 
parliamentarian to be premier and the latter selects his own 
colleagues. 

The real executive in France, as in all parliamentary coun- 
tries, is the ministry or cabinet. Ministers are almost always 
members of parliament. They may sit in both The 
chambers and may address the legislators as often mimstf y 
as seems desirable. A minister's position is no sinecure. Not 
only must he conduct his department, but he must also be 
constantly before parliament to present, explain, and defend 
his measures. Any senator or deputy may direct a formal 
question at a minister on the conduct of his office. Such 
an "interpellation" puts the ministry on the defensive and 
precipitates a brisk debate. If the Chamber of Deputies 
ends by passing a vote of "no confidence," the ministry 
resigns. 

France has no real parties, but only political groups. The 
elections of 1919, for instance, returned representatives of 
nine such groups to the Chamber of Deputies. Political 
The majority of members are Republicans of s rou P s 
various shades of opinion, ranging from conservatism to 



502 



The Continental Countries 



radicalism. There are several large groups of socialists, as well 
as a few Monarchists, who would like to restore either the 
Bourbons or the Bonapartes. 

The existence of so many political groups explains why changes 







The Pantheon, Paris 

Built in the second half of the eighteenth century, on the site of the tomb of Ste.-Genevieve, 
the patron saint of Paris. Used originally as a church, but secularized by the revolutionists 
in 1 791 as a sepulcher for great Frenchmen. Voltaire and Rousseau are entombed here. 
The pediment is filled with a sculptured group representing France distributing laurels to her 
children. 

of ministry are frequent in France. No ministry can arise 
Ministerial except one which represents a coalition (bloc) of 
changes several groups; no ministry can live long unless 

it keeps the support of several groups. In fact, it never does 



The Third French Republic 503 

live long. France since 1875 has averaged more than one min- 
istry a year. A ministerial change, however, is far less signifi- 
cant in France than in Great Britain, owing to the absence 
of one opposition party able to take the reins of government. 
Many members of a defeated ministry are found, as a rule, in 
the ministry which succeeds it, with perhaps a change of port- 
folios. Leading politicians may thus remain almost continu- 
ously in office for a long period. 

It should be noted, finally, that France has a permanent 
body of nearly one million officials, who carry on their adminis- 
trative duties unvexed by ministerial "crises." The 
This bureaucracy, or civil service, is especially bureaucrac y 
necessary in France, which, as contrasted with the United 
States, forms a highly centralized republic. The systematic 
organization of the country into departements and their sub- 
divisions by the French revolutionists and Napoleon l has been 
retained to the present time, with the result that the govern- 
ment, both national and local, is directed from Paris. The 
state keeps representatives everywhere, and an hour after an 
order has been given at the capital it can be carried out in the 
remotest hamlet. Such centralization seems curious in so 
democratic a country as France, but it apparently satisfies 
the French demand for order and regularity in the conduct of 
public affairs. 

The most extensive French colonies are those in Africa. 
From Algeria, France has expanded, eastward over Tunis, 
westward over Morocco, and southward into the Colonial 
Sahara. She also holds French Somaliland, a P° ssessions 
strategic point at the entrance of the Red Sea, and the large 
island of Madagascar. In Asia she has retained her Indian 
possessions and has enlarged her territories in Indo-China. In 
Oceania she possesses New Caledonia and several archipelagoes. 
The American colonies of France have not been increased since 
1783. The area of this colonial empire is, roughly speaking, 
about twenty times that of France. Its population about equals 
that of the home country. 

1 See pages 376 and 391. 



5°4 



The Continental Countries 



Nearly all the colonies lie within the tropics. The only 
countries having a considerable French population are Algeria, 
Colonial ad- Tunis, and New Caledonia. It follows that the 
ministration va ] ue to France of her overseas possessions is 
mainly commercial, as a source of raw materials and a field 
for the investment of capital. The World War also demon- 
strated their value in furnishing native soldiers and laborers. 




Chamber of Deputies, Paris 

This fine structure was built in the eighteenth century as a palace for members of the 
Bourbon-Conde family. It became national property during the French Revolution. The 
facade, which faces the Pont de la Concorde, is in the style of an ancient temple. 

The French government respects the institutions of the in- 
habitants and makes every effort to raise their moral and 
economic condition. None of the colonies is self-governing 
in the manner of the British Dominions, but some of them elect 
representatives to the French legislature. Algeria is treated 
in many respects, not as a colony, but as an integral part of 
France. 1 

1 For a list of the French colonial possessions in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and 
America see the chart, page 4gi. 



Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Belgium 505 

135. Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Belgium 

The kingdom of Italy ranks next to the French Republic 
among the Latin states of contemporary Europe. The Italian 
constitution is the royal charter granted by Charles Constitution 
Albert of Sardinia in 1848, 1 and between 1859 of Italy 
and 1870 extended by plebiscites to the entire peninsula. 2 
During these momentous years Italy thus gained both national 
unity and constitutional government. 

Italy has a well developed parliamentary system. Supreme 

authority resides in a parliament of two houses, consisting of 

an appointive Senate and an elective Chamber of T ,. 
t-. • • • • Italian 

Deputies. A ministry or cabinet conducts the pariia- 

government, subject to the will of the Chamber mentar y 

. . . system 

of Deputies. When a ministry resigns, some 

party leader is selected by the king to form its successor. The 

king otherwise exerts little influence upon domestic politics. 

He never vetoes bills passed by both branches of the legislature, 

seldom attends cabinet meetings, and appoints to office only 

those recommended by his ministers. An Italian monarch 

holds essentially the same ornamental position as a British 

sovereign or a French president. The house of Savoy is very 

popular in Italy, for Victor Emmanuel II, his son Humbert I, 

and Victor Emmanuel III, the present ruler, have shown 

themselves truly democratic and devoted to the welfare of 

their subjects. 

The party system of Italy resembles that of France. Political 

groups are numerous, rather loosely organized, and subject 

to constant fluctuation. Only three groups have Italian 

well defined programs and constituencies. The P arties 

Republicans, faithful to the traditions of Mazzini and Garibaldi, 

continue to agitate for a republican form of government; 

they are few in number. The Socialists stand for the same 

things as their brethren in other countries. They find recruits 

chiefly among the workingmen of the cities. The Catholics, 

or Clericals, who have only recently been allowed by the pope 

1 See page 451. 2 See pages 453~4S6. 



Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Belgium 507 

to form a separate political party, uphold the influence of the 
Church in politics ; their strength is among the peasantry. 

Italian politics has long been complicated by the hostility 
between the government and the papacy. Cavour wanted the 
pope to give up his temporal power and retain Church and 
only a spiritual sway over Catholics throughout StateinItal y 
the world. The pope did not favor this solution of the prob- 
lem and clung to the States of the Church, which after i860 
included only Rome and its neighborhood. He lost even these 
possessions ten years later, when Italian troops occupied Rome. 
The temporal power of the papacy thus disappeared, after an 
existence of more than a thousand years. 

The relations of Church and State in Italy were henceforth 
defined by the Law of Papal Guarantees, enacted in 187 1. It 
allowed the pope to retain his position as an Law of Papal 
independent sovereign, and as such to have his Guarantees 
own court and diplomatic representatives, without interference 
from the Italian government. The papal territory, however^ 
was limited to the Vatican and Lateran palaces in Rome, with 
their extensive gardens. 

The Law of Papal Guarantees has never been acknowledged 
as valid by the popes. Pius IX, who occupied the chair of 
St. Peter in 1871, refused to recognize the new T he 
Italian kingdom and shut himself up in the Vati- " prisoner of 
can. He also issued a decree forbidding Italian 
Catholics to vote or hold office under the royal government. 
His successors, Leo XIII and Pius X, continued this prohibi- 
tion, but it has been entirely removed by the present pope, 
Benedict XV. With the entrance into Italian politics of a dis- 
tinct Catholic party, the relations between the government and 
the "prisoner of the Vatican" promise to enter upon a new 
phase. 

Italy's desire to rank among the great powers led her to take 
part in the scramble for overseas possessions, which has been 
so marked a feature of European history during Italian 
the last half century. The Italians have estab- colonies 
lished themselves in Eritrea and part of Somaliland, on the 



508 The Continental Countries 

eastern coast of Africa. In 191 1 Italy declared war on Turkey 
and conquered Tripolitana and Cyrenaica in northern Africa. 
The two provinces have been organized as a colony under the 
name of Libya. None of these African territories offers an 
inviting field for Italian settlement. The New World (Ar- 
gentina, Brazil, and the United States) continues to receive 
most of the peasants and workingmen who emigrate from Italy. 

Spain during the nineteenth century had a checkered history. 
Ferdinand VII, the Bourbon king who came back after Na- 
Kingdom poleon's downfall, ruled so wretchedly as to pro- 
of Spain yoke an uprising. 1 This led to intervention by 
the Concert of Europe and his second restoration. 2 After his 
death Spain suffered from revolutions and civil wars. Early 
in the 'seventies the Spanish Liberals proclaimed a republic. 
Two insurrections, four coups d'etat, and five presidents marked 
its brief course. The old dynasty of the Bourbons recovered 
the throne in 1875 and still occupies it. The present monarch 
is Ferdinand's great-grandson, Alfonso XIII. 

The constitution is liberal in character. It provides for a 
parliament (cortes) of two chambers and a responsible min- 
The Spanish istry. Manhood suffrage prevails. The king, 
constitution as in Italyj en j oys little real authority, for all his 
decrees must be countersigned by a minister to be valid. Should 
the royal line become extinct, the constitution provides for 
popular election of a monarch. 

The vast colonial empire of Spain was still intact a little 
more than a hundred years ago. The Spanish possessions 
Spanish in Mexico, Central America, and South America 

colonies £ rst b ecame separate republics when Joseph Bona- 

parte mounted the throne of Spain in 1808. They definitely 
separated from the mother country after the restoration of 
Ferdinand VII. Cuba continued to be a badly governed and 
restless dependency until the United States intervened in 1898. 
At the Peace of Paris, which concluded the Spanish-Ameri- 
can War, Spain renounced her sovereignty over Cuba and ceded 
Porto Rico and the Philippines to the United States. A year 

1 See page 414. 2 See page 423. 



Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Belgium 509 

later, she sold to Germany her remaining island possessions in 
the Pacific. Her few African possessions, recently acquired, 
are a poor compensation for the loss of what was once the 
greatest colonial empire in the world. 

Portuguese history in the nineteenth century to some extent 
duplicates that of Spain. Misgovernment, insurrections, and 
armed conflicts between rival factions kept the Republic of 
little country in turmoil for many years. From Portu e al 
about the middle of the century the Portuguese had peace, 
but the failure of kingly rule to lessen taxes and introduce 
reforms resulted in much discontent, which found expression 
in republican propaganda. Matters came to a crisis in 19 10, 
when a well-planned uprising in Lisbon drove the Portuguese 
ruler into exile. The revolutionists declared the dynasty of 
the Braganzas forever deposed and set up a republic. It still 
endures, in spite of much opposition from those who remain 
attached to the old monarchical regime. The republican 
constitution closely follows that of France. 

Though Portugal lost Brazil in the early 'twenties of the 
last century, she still keeps a colonial empire surpassed in ex- 
tent only by the dominions of Great Britain and Portuguese 
France. It is almost twenty-five times the size colonies 
of the mother country. The most important Portuguese pos- 
sessions are in Africa. The Azores and the Madeira Islands, 
which belong to Portugal, scarcely rank as colonies, being 
fully incorporated in the government of that country. 

The circumstances under which Belgium separated from 
Holland and became independent, with her perpetual neutrality 
guaranteed by the Concert of Europe, have been Kingdom 
related in an earlier chapter. The Belgians, like of Bel g ium 
the Swiss, form a united nation, in spite of the linguistic barriers 
between them. French is spoken by the Walloons in the 
southern provinces, and Flemish, a Teutonic tongue, by the 
Flemings in the northern provinces. Both Walloons and 
Flemings are almost wholly Roman Catholics. The consti- 
tution, framed in 1831, set up a limited monarchy of the mod- 
ern type. Belgium has never had any trouble with her rulers, 



510 The Continental Countries 

because they have steadily adhered to that clause of the con- 
stitution which declares that "all powers emanate from the 
people." 

Belgium possesses only one colony, but it is about ten times 
her size. The vast district in Central Africa, formerly known as 
The Belgian the Congo Free State and now as the Belgian 
Congo Congo, was established in the early 'eighties by 

Leopold II, mainly as a commercial undertaking. The king 
became personal sovereign of the state, which proved to be 
very valuable for its rubber, ivory, and other products. In 
1908 Leopold II surrendered his Congo properties to Belgium. 

136. Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden 

The Congress of Vienna left Switzerland a confederation of 
twenty-two semi-independent cantons. The only bond be- 
The Swiss tween them was a common Diet, whose limited 
Confedera- power recalls that of the American Congress 
under the Articles of Confederation. A new con- 
stitution, adopted in 1848 and subsequently revised, established 
a federal government somewhat resembling that of the United 
States. There is a legislature of two houses, the lower repre- 
senting the people directly, the upper, each canton. The 
two houses in joint session select a committee of seven to 
act as an executive. The president of the confederation is 
merely the chairman of this committee. He serves for one 
year only and has no greater authority than his fellow mem- 
bers. In the dovetailing of federal and state powers the Swiss 
constitution follows American precedents. The federal gov- 
ernment regulates matters affecting all the people, such as for- 
eign relations, tariffs, coinage, the .postal service, and the army, 
but the several cantons retain control of local concerns. 

In some parts of Switzerland the inhabitants have preserved 
their ancient open-air assemblies, where all the male citizens 
Direct appear personally, once a year, and by a show 

democracy f h an( is elect officials, levy taxes, and make the 
laws. Such direct or pure democracy is possible only in the 
smaller and less thickly populated cantons. 



Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden 511 

The larger cantons possess representative assemblies, but 
over them the people exercise constant control by means of the 
referendum and the initiative. In some cantons Referendum 
every measure passed by the cantonal legislature and 
must be submitted to a popular vote for adoption 
or rejection ; in the others submission takes place only upon 
petition of a specified number of voters. The complement 
of such a referendum is the initiative, giving a specified number 
of voters the right to propose new laws, which must then be 
referred to a popular vote. The referendum and initiative also 
apply to federal legislation, for both ordinary laws and consti- 
tutional amendments. 

The Swiss differ markedly among themselves in language, in 
religion, and customs. About seventy per cent of the in- 
habitants are German-speaking ; the remainder The Swiss 
speak either French or Italian. All three languages natl0n 
are used for the proclamation of laws and in legislative debates. 
Zwinglian and Calvinist Protestants include more than three- 
fifths of the population, but have a majority in only half of the 
cantons. Full religious liberty is guaranteed to all citizens. 
This policy of mutual toleration prevents either language or 
religion from becoming a divisive force; it keeps the Swiss a 
united nation. 

The kingdom of Holland — more accurately, the Nether- 
lands — is one of the creations of the Vienna Congress. It 
forms a federal state, consisting (since the loss of The Dutch 
Belgium) of eleven provinces. These retain a kin s dom 
large measure of self-government . The house of Orange has 
reigned continuously since 181 5, the present sovereign being 
Queen Wilhelmina. The constitution of Holland also dates 
from 181 5. Successive revisions have made it a fairly liberal 
document. The Crown is still powerful, but the royal min- 
isters are responsible to the Estates-General, or parliament. 
The franchise has recently been granted to all adult men and 
women without restriction. 

Holland still keeps various tropical dependencies secured in 
the seventeenth century. They are about sixty times as 



512 The Continental Countries 

large and six times as populous as the mother country. Their 
coffee, tea, sugar, spices, tobacco, and indigo reach Holland 
Dutch in large quantities, for distribution throughout 

colonies Europe. On the whole, she administers them 

very successfully. 

Nature seems to have intended Scandinavia to be one coun- 
try. Only a narrow, shallow sea parts Denmark from her 
Tlie northern neighbors, while the well settled districts 

Scandina- of Norway and Sweden are not separated by any 
natural barrier. The Danes, Norwegians, and 
Swedes have also very much in common. They descend from 
the old Vikings, who became the terror of Europe in the ninth 
century. Their languages resemble one another closely, 
Danish and Norwegian in the written form being identical. 
They have all been Lutheran Protestants since the sixteenth 
century. They all live under similar physical conditions and 
support themselves by agriculture, commerce, and the fisheries, 
rather than by manufacturing. Nevertheless, antagonisms 
due to historical causes proved stronger than unity of race, 
language, and culture, with the result that there are three 
small and comparatively weak nations when one large and 
powerful nation might have been consolidated. All have a 
monarchical form of government, with written constitutions, 
bicameral parliaments, responsible ministries, and universal 
suffrage. 

Norway and Sweden were joined after 1815 in a personal 
union under the Swedish king. 1 This arrangement continued 
Relations of until 1 905. Norway and Sweden then separated 
Norway and peacefully, as the result of a plebiscite in which 
the Norwegians, almost to a man, voted for com- 
plete independence. In order to prevent future conflicts, a 
"buffer " zone, within which no fortress may be erected or troops 
maintained, has been established between the two countries. 

Neither Norway nor Sweden has any colonies. 2 Denmark 

1 See page 417. 

2 In ig2o the Peace Conference placed the Spitzbergen Archipelago in the Arctic 
Ocean under the sovereignty of Norway. 



The German Empire 513 

had three, until recently. The most important was Iceland, 
which the adventurous Vikings settled more than a thousand 
years ago. Iceland received home rule during Iceland and 
the 'seventies, and in 1918, in complete agreement Greenland 
with Denmark, became a sovereign state under its own flag. 
The king of Denmark remains Iceland's king, but for purely 
ornamental purposes. Denmark has also recently parted with 
her possessions in the West Indies, which she sold to the United 
States in 191 7. They have been renamed the Virgin Islands. 
Greenland continues to be Danish, but enjoys self-government. 
The Faroe Islands are definitely incorporated in the Danish 
kingdom. 

137. The German Empire, 1871-1918 

The German Empire, as established in 1871, was a federa- 
tion. It included twenty-six states : four kingdoms, six grand 
duchies, five duchies, seven principalities, three A federal 
free cities, 1 and the imperial territory of Alsace- em P ire 
Lorraine. The constitution allowed each state (but not Alsace- 
Lorraine until 191 1) to manage its local concerns and specified 
what authority should be exercised by the federal government. 
The German Empire thus represented a compromise between the 
old Germanic Confederation, which formed a union of sovereign 
states, and the thoroughly centralized Prussian monarchy. 

The king of Prussia, as ex officio president of the federation, 
received the title of German Emperor. He was not called 
"Emperor of Germany," for such a title would The 
have implied his superiority in rank to the other em P eror 
German kings. The kaiser had very great powers, particularly 
in time of war. He commanded the army and navy, thus con- 
trolling the entire military organization of the empire; ap- 
pointed and received ambassadors ; and through the imperial 
chancellor, whom he selected, influenced both foreign and 
domestic policies. He might also of his own notion declare 
a defensive war, but the declaration of an offensive war re- 
quired the consent of the Bundesrat. The kaiser was quite 

1 Hamburg, Bremen, and Liibeck. 



514 The Continental Countries 

irresponsible in his exercise of these powers ; he could neither 
be punished nor removed from office for his acts. 

The members of the Federal Council, or Bundesrat, were 
apportioned among the states roughly according to size. 
The Prussia had seventeen ; Bavaria, the next largest, 

Bundesrat s j x . anc j a g rea t man y states, only one each. The 
delegation from each state voted as a unit and always in ac- 
cordance with instructions given to them by their respective 
governments. The consequence was that the Bundesrat 
formed an aristocratic council of diplomats, representing (ex- 
cept in the case of the free cities) the hereditary German princes. 
The Bundesrat, in practice, made all the laws. It shaped in 
secret sessions the bills to be laid before the Reichstag for ap- 
proval, and it had a veto of any measure passed by the latter 
body. 

The members of the Imperial Diet, or Reichstag, were elected 
by manhood suffrage. Though democratic in composition, 
The the Reichstag exerted little influence on legisla- 

Reichstag t j 0n j t m ight- introduce bills, but few of them 
were likely to receive the assent of the Bundesrat. If, how- 
ever, the Reichstag refused to pass a government measure, the 
Bundesrat and the emperor could dissolve it and order a new 
election. The Reichstag was dissolved four times, and after 
each dissolution the new assembly meekly passed the bill which 
its predecessor had rejected. As compared with the British 
House of Commons or the French Chamber of Deputies, the 
Reichstag formed little more than a debating society; it dis- 
cussed, it did not govern. 

The emperor's representative in dealing with the legislature 
was the chancellor. This official corresponded only in slight 
The degree to the prime minister or premier in other 

chancellor governments. He was responsible solely to the 
emperor, who appointed him and dismissed him at will. The 
chancellor presided over the Bundesrat, and in the name of the 
emperor laid before the Reichstag all measures which the 
Bundesrat had framed. He also selected the chief federal 
officials and supervised their activity. 



The German Empire 



5i5 



It is clear that, while the German Empire was a constitu- 
tional state, it was not a democratic state. No ministry rose 

or fell at the will of the Reichstag, and the chan- .. 

07 / Absence of 

cellor, the emperor's agent, held his position as a parlia- 

long as he retained the emperor's confidence. me ° tar y 
_ r system 

Unlike Great Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Portu- 
gal, Belgium, Holland, and the Scandinavian countries, Germany 
did not have a genuine parliamentary system. 




The Reichstagsgebaude, Berlin 

This building accommodates both the Reichsrat (formerly called the Bundesrat) and 
the Reichstag. 

Prussia, with approximately two-thirds the area and two- 
thirds the population of Germany, naturally held the leading 
place in the empire. The king of Prussia was Para _ 
German emperor ; of the five chancellors between mountcy of 
1871 and 1914 all but one were Prussians; and russia 
Prussia kept a majority of representatives in the Reichstag. 
Her seventeen votes in the Bundesrat did not assure her a 
majority there, but she almost always obtained the support of 
enough states to carry any legislation desired. On the other 
hand, if Prussia opposed a bill in the Bundesrat, not less than 
twelve of the largest states had to combine in order to secure 
a majority against her. 



516 The Continental Countries 

The paramountcy of Prussia makes it highly important to 
understand the government of that country. The constitution 
The which Frederick William IV "granted" in 1850 

Prussian to his faithful subjects, 1 did not seriously limit 

the royal power. The upper house of the Prussian 
parliament consisted of nobles and wealthy Junkers, whom 
the king appointed for life and whose numbers he could en- 
large at will. The lower and supposedly popular branch of 
parliament was elected according to a system which gave the 
richer classes an overwhelming influence. It might happen 
— it did happen — that the vote of one wealthy man had as 
great weight as the votes of a thousand poor workingmen. 
Even Bismarck, no friend of democracy, called the Prussian 
electoral system the worst ever devised. To complete this 
outline, it should be added that the king possessed a veto of all 
legislation passed by parliament ; that the ministry was re- 
sponsible to him and not to parliament ; and that the consti- 
tution expressly recognized his divine right to rule. "Abso- 
lutism under constitutional forms" is the description which a 
great German scholar — himself a Prussian — once correctly 
applied to the government of Prussia. 

It is important to note that several non-Germanic peoples were 
incorporated in the German Empire against their will. The 
Non- Poles of West Prussia, East Prussia, and Posen, the 

Germans Danes of Schleswig, and the inhabitants of Alsace- 
Lorraine made up about one-twelfth of the total population of 
Germany. The three "submerged nationalities" managed to 
preserve their own languages and culture, in spite of persistent 
efforts on the part of the government to Germanize them. 

German history between 1871 and 1914 falls naturally into 
two periods, the first of which is covered by the reign of William 
Reign of I- The emperor left both domestic and foreign 

William I, affairs almost entirely in the strong hands of Bis- 

1871—1888 

marck, who served as imperial chancellor and 
president of the Prussian ministry. The architect of the empire 
presided over its destinies for almost twenty years. 

1 See page 439. 



The German Empire 517 

Bismarck still held office when William I passed away in 1888, 
at the age of ninety-one. His successor, Frederick III, who 
had married a daughter of Queen Victoria, seems 
to have been a man of decidedly democratic views ni 
and an admirer of the British parliamentary sys- 
tem. German Liberals looked forward with great hope to his 
reign. But the third Frederick mounted the throne only to 
die within a few months. In the light of subsequent events, 
his untimely death was a misfortune for Germany, for Europe, 
and for the world. 

Frederick's son, William II, became king of Prussia and 
German emperor when not quite twenty-nine years of age. In 
this last of the Hohenzollerns 1 culminated all R e j gn f 
their absolutism, their contempt of popular gov- William n, 

1 fi^ft— 1 Q1 ft 

ernment, and their firm belief in the doctrine of 

divine right. "The will of the king is the supreme law," he 

1 HOHENZOLLERN DYNASTY (1640-1918) 

Frederick William, the Great Elector 
(1640-1688) 

Frederick I 
(1688-1701, elector; 1701-1713, king) 



Frederick William I 
(1 713-1740) 


I 

Frederick II, the Great 

(1740-1786) 


August William 

Frederick William II 
(1786-1797) 
1 




Frederick William III 
(1 797-1 840) 


1 

Frederick William IV 

(1840-1861) 


William I 
(1861-1888, king; 1871-1888, emperor) 
1 




Frederick III 

(1888) 




William II 
(1888-19 1 8) 



5i8 



The Continental Countries 




The German National Monument 

Designed by Johannes Schilling; begun in 1877; completed in 1883. The monument 
stands on a wooded hillside opposite Bingen and overlooking the Rhine Valley. The great 
base, 82 feet high, supports an impressive figure of Germania, 34 feet high, with the imperial 
crown and the laurel-wreathed sword. On the side of the pedestal facing the river is a design 
symbolizing "The Watch on the Rhine." The other sides of the pedestal bear designs repre- 
senting various scenes in the Franco-German War. 



The Dual Monarchy 519 

himself declared. The young ruler could not work well with 
the old chancellor, who had so long reigned in all but name. 
Friction between them led to Bismarck's enforced resignation 
of the chancellorship in 1890. His four successors in that office 
were merely mouthpieces of the emperor; after 1890 William 
II was, in effect, his own chancellor. 

138. The Dual Monarchy, 1867-1918 

The student will recall how the democratic and national 
movement, which swept over Europe after the "February 
Revolution," threatened at first to break the Austria and 
Hapsburg realm into fragments. But the time Hun s ar y 
for its dissolution had not yet come. Austria emerged tri- 
umphant from the storm of revolution, and under the youth- 
ful emperor, Francis Joseph I, returned to the well-worn path 
of absolutism and reaction. Hungary, especially, felt the full 
weight of Austria? displeasure, as the result of her failure to 
win freedom under Kossuth in 1849. Ever since 1526, when 
the Magyars sought the protection of Austria against the Otto- 
man Turks and elected a Hapsburg king of Hungary, they had 
continued to enjoy some measure of self-government. Their 
country was now cut into five districts, ruled by Germans 
from Vienna, and German was made the official language every- 
where. These measures did not succeed in obliterating the sense 
of nationality among the Magyars. After the two disastrous 
wars of 1859 and 1866, which expelled the Austrians from Italy 
and Germany, Francis Joseph found himself obliged to pursue 
a more conciliatory policy toward the Magyars and finally 
gave his consent to the constitution known as the Ausgleich 
(Compromise). 

The Ausgleich created a dual monarchy, something more 
than a personal union and yet less than a close federation. The 
dominions of the Hapsburgs were split into two The 
self-governing states: (1) the Austrian Empire, Aus s Ieich 
including Upper Austria, Lower Austria, Bohemia, Moravia, 
Galicia, and twelve other provinces; and (2) the kingdom of 
Hungary, including Croatia-Slavonia. Each country had its 



520 



The Continental Countries 



Discord of 
nationalities 
in Austria- 
Hungary 

Hungary. 



own parliament, ministry, courts, officials, language, and 
capital (Vienna and Budapest). Both had one flag, one army 
and navy, and one sovereign, who wore the joint crown of 
Austrian emperor and Hungarian king. There was also a 
common tariff, a common coinage, and a common administra- 
tion of foreign affairs. This political makeshift had to be re- 
newed every decade. It 
managed to survive until the 
revolutionary year of 1918. 

The Ausgleich formed, in 
effect, a league between the 
Germans and the 
Magyars, the two 
strongest nation- 
alities of Austria- 
They were not 
only determined to preserve 
their own language and cus- 
toms, but also to force them 
on the Slavs, Rumanians, 
and Italians. The result was 
great and increasing bitter- 
ness between the dominant 
Feancis Joseph I an d subject peoples of the 

After a portrait made in the emperor's boyhood. T)iiq 1 Monarchv 

The relations between Austria and Hungary under the 
Ausgleich were not always amicable. Perhaps the strongest 
Francis tie holding the two countries together was a deep- 

Joseph I seated loyalty to the venerable Francis Joseph. 

The emperor's long reign bridged the gap between the era of 
Metternich and the World War, between 1848 and 1914. De- 
spite heavy private griefs — the execution of his brother Maxi- 
milian, whom Napoleon III had set on the throne of Mexico 
and then deserted ; the suicide of his only son ; the murder of 
his wife by an anarchist ; and the assassination of his nephew 
and heir — Francis Joseph never forgot the duties of a monarch. 
He mixed freely among the people, received them in public 




The Russian Empire 521 

audience, speaking now one, now another, of the many lan- 
guages of his dominions, and worked harder at the business 
of governing than any of his ministers. The emperor-king died 
in harness in 1916. The crowns of Austria and Hungary then 
descended to his grandnephew, Charles I, who reigned less than 
two years. 1 

139. The Russian Empire 

The influence of geographical conditions is clearly seen in 
Russian history. European Russia forms an immense, un- 
broken plain, threaded by numerous rivers which European 
facilitate movement into every part of the coun- Russia 
try. While the rest of Europe, with its mountain ranges and 
deep inlets of the sea, tended to divide into many separate 
states, Russia just as naturally became a single state. 

The inhabitants of Russia are mainly Eastern Slavs, the 
descendants of Slavic emigrants from the Danube and Elbe 
valleys during the early Middle Ages. They 
separated, centuries ago, into three groups. By 
far the largest group is that of the Great Russians, who occupy 

1 Hapsburg Dynasty (1745-1918) 

Maria Theresa m. Francis I 

(Austrian ruler, 1740-1780) (Holy Roman Emperor, 1745-1765) 



Joseph II Leopold II 

(1765-1790) (1790-1792) 

Francis II 

(Holy Roman Emperor, 1 792-1 806; 

as emperor of Austria, Francis I, 1 806-1 835) 



Ferdinand I Francis Charles 
(1835-1848) I 

I I 

Francis Joseph I Charles Louis 

(1848-1916) |_ 

Francis Ferdinand Otto 

Charles I 
(1916-1918) 



522 The Continental Countries 

the interior, the north, and the east of Russia. Their his- 
toric center is Moscow on the Moskva River, the capital of the 
medieval principality of Muscovy. The Little Russians (Ru- 
thenians, Ukrainians) hold the south and southwest of the coun- 
try. They center about the holy city of Kiev on the Dnieper, 
where in 988 the Scandinavian Northmen adopted the Eastern 
or Greek form of Christianity for themselves, and for the Slavs 
among whom they settled. The White Russians, whose name 
is probably derived from their light-colored clothes, dwell to 
the west, in lands which once belonged to Lithuania. 1 

The three Russian peoples speak different dialects of one 
Slavic language. The dialectical differences are sufficient to 
Linguistic prevent a Muscovite from understanding a 
unity Ukrainian and both from conversing with a White 

Russian. For literary and official purposes, the Moscow 
dialect is everywhere employed. The alphabet in use comes 
from the Greek, enriched with special signs for Slavic letters. 

The three Russian peoples also unite in a common allegiance 
to the Orthodox Church. This was an offshoot of the medieval 
Religious Greek Church, from which most of its doctrines 
unity an( j r jj- ua j have been derived. Until the Russian 

Revolution of 191 7, the tsar remained the head of the church, 
as far as to make and annul all appointments to ecclesiastical 
office. Russia, it may be noted, contains numberless dissent- 
ing sects, which formerly encountered persecution by the gov- 
ernment for their unorthodox beliefs and practices. 

The seaward expansion of Russia in Europe gradually en- 
rolled many non-Russians among the tsar's subjects.! They 
Non- were found principally along the frontier. Peter 

Russians fae Great annexed several Baltic provinces con- 
taining Esthonians, Letts, and Germans. Catherine II ab- 
sorbed the greater part of Poland, and by her conquest of the 
Crimea and the northern coast of the Black Sea added to the 
empire millions of Mohammedan Tatars. Early in the nine- 
teenth century Alexander I took Finland from Sweden (1809), 
wrested Bessarabia from Turkey (1812), secured a further 

1 See the map between pages 718-719. 2 See the maps on pages 303 and 524. 




, a *< a> 



523 



524 



The Continental Countries 




RUSSIA I> EUROPE 

during the 
NINETEENTH CENTURY 

Scale of Miles 



| Russia at death of Catherine II, 1796 A.D. 

I Acquisitions under Paul, 1796-1801 A.D. 
I | Acquisitions under Alexander 1, 1801-1825 A.D. 

1 I Acquisitions under Nicholas I, 1825-1855 A.D. 

| Acquisitions under Alexander II, 1855-1881 A.D. 



L'Misitiidi' KilPt SO of G 



slice of Poland (1815), and began the conquest of Caucasia. 
The Caucasian territory with its mixed population (Georgians, 
Circassians, Armenians, etc.) was not finally incorporated in 
the empire until after the middle of the century. Russia then 
reached her territorial limits in Europe. The break-up of the 
country since the World War has enabled most of these frontier 
peoples to establish independent states. 

The hodge-podge of tenitories and Babel of peoples com- 
posing the Russian Empire in the nineteenth century was 
ruled by an autocratic tsar. His decrees were binding on all 



The Russian Empire 525 

his subjects. Russian laws called him an "independent and 
absolute sovereign" and declared that God "orders men to 
submit to his superior authority, not only from Russian 
fear of punishment, but as a religious duty." autocrac y 
Many educated Russians, who perhaps were not greatly im- 
pressed by this appeal to divine right, nevertheless considered 
autocratic government a practical necessity for Russia. The 
enormous size and varied population of the country, the dense 
ignorance of most of its inhabitants, and the absence of a 
prosperous, progressive middle class, which could take part in 
political life, seemed to indicate that the triumph of democracy 
would be long postponed in the tsar's domains. The chief 
interest of Russian history during the last century lies, there- 
fore, in the development of liberalism, which gradually under- 
mined the whole fabric of autocracy, and in the revolutionary 
year of 1917 brought it crashing to the ground. 1 

Alexander I, grandson of Catherine II, began as a monarch 
of enlightened views. Under the influence of his Swiss tutor, 
he imbibed many democratic ideas of the revo- Alexander I, 
lutionary period in Europe, and he aspired to 1801_182 5 
put them into practice. His ardor for reform grew cold, how- 
ever, after he came under the influence of that foe of liberalism, 
Prince Metternich. The tsar not only signed the Protocol of 

1 Romanov Dynasty (1762-1917) 
Catherine II (1762-1796) 





Paul I (1796- 


1801) 




1 

Alexander I 






71 

Nicholas I 


(1801-1825) 






(1825-1855) 

Alexander II 
(1855-1881) 

Alexander III 
( 1 881-1894) 

Nicholas II 
(1894-1917) 



526 



The Continental Countries 



Troppau, 1 but also cooperated with his brother monarchs in 
putting down the first liberal uprisings in Italy and Spain. 
The last years of his life found him equally reactionary at home. 
Nicholas I, unlike his brother, never felt any sentimental 
sympathy with liberalism. To prevent liberal ideas from 
Nicholas I, spreading among his subjects, the tsar relied on 
1825-1855 a strict censorship of the press, passport regula- 
tions which made it difficult for any one to enter Russia or to 
leave it, an army of spies, and the secret police known as the 

Third Section. The chief of 
the Third Section had unlimited 
power to arrest, imprison, or 
deport a political suspect, with- 
out warrant and without trial. 
During the thirty years' reign 
of Nicholas I, Liberals by tens 
of thousands languished in jail 
or trod the path of exile to 
Siberia. Nicholas was no less 
autocratic in his foreign policy. 
We have already learned how 
ruthlessly heput down the Polish 
insurrection and how he aided 
Francis Joseph I to destroy 
the Hungarian Republic. 2 Once 
only did the tsar espouse a revo- 
lutionary cause. In 1828 he 
sided with the Greeks who had risen against the Turks, but 
even then his purpose was not so much to free Greece as to 
exalt Russia. Nicholas afterwards waged the Crimean War, 
a venture which brought him into conflict with Great Britain, 
France, and Sardinia as the allies of Turkey. He died before 
the war ended. 

Alexander II started out as a benevolent despot. The 
earlier part of his reign was marked by notable reforms, es- 
pecially those which freed the serfs and created elective pro- 

1 See page 421. 2 See pages 430 and 437. 




Nicholas I 



The Russian Empire 



527 



vincial assemblies for local government. But the tsar was 
not a liberal at heart, and his counselors were men trained in 
the school of Nicholas I. They convinced him, as Alexander II, 
Metternich had convinced the first Alexander, that 1855 ~ 1881 
liberalism was a Western novelty, quite unsuited to holy Russia, 




Church of the Resurrection of Christ, Petrograd 

Built on the spot where Alexander II was assassinated. 

and bound to be followed by revolution and the overthrow of 
autocracy. After a Polish insurrection in the early 'sixties, which 
thoroughly frightened the tsar, reaction had full swing in Russia. 



528 The Continental Countries 

The intense disappointment of the educated classes at Alex- 
ander's relapse into the traditional ways of Russian mon- 
archs gave rise to nihilism. 1 It began as an academic doctrine. 
„...,. Radical thinkers, building where the French 

Nihilism 7 ° 

philosophers of the eighteenth century had left 

off, set up reason and science as the twin guides of life. Russia, 
they urged, must make a clean sweep of autocracy, of the 
Orthodox Church, and of every other institution that had 
come down from an unreasoning, unscientific past. Only when 
the ground had been thus cleared, would it be possible to re- 
construct a new and better society. The nihilists before long 
began to seek converts among the masses. Under the guise of 
doctors, school teachers, factory hands, and common laborers, 
they preached the gospel of political, social, and economic 
freedom to artisans in the towns and peasants in the coun- 
try. The government soon got wind of the revolutionary 
movement and imprisoned or exiled those who took part in it. 
The nihilist propaganda of words now passed into a propa- 
ganda of deeds. Since the government ruled by terror, it was 
henceforth to be fought with terror. A secret committee at 
St. Petersburg condemned to death a number of prominent 
officials, spies, and members of the hated Third Section, and 
in some cases succeeded in assassinating them. Alexander 
II himself was murdered in 1881. 

The reign of Alexander III is chiefly significant for the sys- 
tematic efforts made by the government to compel all the 
Alexander non-Russians in the empire to use the Russian 
ill, 1881- language, accept Russian customs, and worship 
according to the rites of the Orthodox Church. 
This policy led to severe treatment of the Finns, Esthonians, 
Letts, Lithuanians, Poles, Germans, and Jews. The perse- 
cution of the Jews was followed by their migration in great 
numbers to the United States. 

The accession of Nicholas II brought no change in the po- 
litical situation. The young man was amiable and well- 
meaning, but as much an autocrat by nature as any of his 

1 Latin nihil, "nothing." 



The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 529 

predecessors. The reactionaries surrounding him now redoubled 
their efforts to keep Russia "frozen." Teachers, students, 
journalists, professional men, in fact, every one Nicholas II, 
who dared think aloud suffered under the iron 1894 1917 
regime. No person was secure against arbitrary arrest, im- 
prisonment, exile, or execution. Meanwhile, the opposition 
to autocracy developed rapidly in Russia, not only among 
the working people and peasants, but also among the middle 
classes and enlightened members of the nobility. All the 
liberal and discontented elements combined to demand for 
Russia the free institutions which were now no longer novelties 
in western Europe. Revolutionary disorders at length com- 
pelled the tsar to issue decrees in 1905-1906, granting franchise 
rights and providing for a representative assembly (Duma). 
The Duma met four times and accomplished some useful legis- 
lation. It did not succeed, however, in winning liberty for the 
people. When the World War broke out, the corrupt and in- 
efficient autocracy seemed to be as firmly seated as ever in 
Russia. 

140. The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 

In its general contour the Balkan Peninsula resembles an 
inverted triangle, the apex of which ends in the Morea (an- 
ciently the Peloponnesus). Examination of a The Balkan 
physical map shows that the surface is almost en- Peninsula 
tirely mountainous, the only extensive plains being those formed 
by the valleys of the Danube and the Maritza, and the basin of 
Thessaly. The line of the Balkans clearly separates the upper 
from the lower portion of the peninsula, but so many routes 
cross them that they have always formed simply an obstacle, 
never a barrier, to invading peoples from the north. Owing 
to the distribution of the mountain ranges, the principal rivers 
empty into the Black Sea and the ^Egean, rather than into the 
Adriatic. The best harbors and most numerous islands are 
also located on the eastern side of the peninsula. The Balkans, 
in fact, form a part of the Near East, and their history during 
modern times is indissolubly linked with the Eastern Question. 



530 The Continental Countries 

No other part of Europe of equal extent contains so many 
different peoples as the Balkan Peninsula. 1 The original 
Inhabitants inhabitants are represented to-day by the Alba- 
of the Balkan nians. The Greeks rank as the next oldest inhabit- 
ants of the peninsula, though the original purity 
of their blood has been adulterated by intermixture with Al- 
banians and Slavs. Toward the end of the sixth century A.D., 
the South Slavs (Jugoslavs) began to leave their homes among 
the Carpathians and to occupy the region south of the Danube. 
The Bulgarians, a people of remotely Asiatic origin and akin 
to the Magyars and Turks, first appeared in the seventh cen- 
tury. They adopted the speech, religion, and culture of the 
South Slavs. The Rumanians claim descent from the Roman 
colonists of Dacia north of the Danube; they seem to be, 
however, chiefly the descendants of Slavic immigrants. The 
Turks descend from the Ottoman invaders of the fourteenth 
and fifteenth centuries and from later immigrants. Inter- 
marriage with their Christian captives and converts from Chris- 
tianity to Islam has made the Turks substantially European 
in physique. The Turkish population is nowhere found in 
compact masses except in northeastern Bulgaria and in the 
vicinity of Adrianople and Constantinople. 

The empire of the Ottoman Turks formed a typical Oriental 
despotism. The sultan was not only lord of the Turkish realm 
The Otto- in both Asia and Europe, but also the caliph, or 
man Empire spiritual head, of all Islam. He lived shut up in 
his seraglio at Constantinople and depended upon his vizier 
(prime minister) and divan (council of ministers) to execute 
his will. Each province had a pasha (governor) nominally 
subject to the sultan, but more often than not practically inde- 
pendent of him. The professional soldiers known as Janizaries, 
who at first had been exclusively recruited from Christian chil- 
dren, comprised the standing army. 

Only those who accepted Islam were citizens of the Ottoman 
Empire. The Turks tolerated the presence of Christians, but 
deprived them of all political rights. Unbelievers could not 

1 See the map between pages 718-719. 



The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 531 

hold any civil office or serve in the army. They also had 
to pay heavy taxes not imposed upon Moslems. Some Chris- 
tians accepted the faith of their conquerors in Turks and 
order to secure the privileges of citizenship. Even Chnstians 
including these converts, the Turks in southeastern Europe 
remained a small minority of the population. Impassable 
barriers, raised by differences of race, language, religion, and 
customs, separated them from their subjects. 

The Ottoman Empire in the eighteenth century showed plain 
signs of the blight which inevitably descends upon states built 
up by the sword and maintained only by the Decadence 
sword. Few of its despotic sovereigns possessed of Turke y 
real ability, and the control of affairs passed more and more 
into the hands of self-seeking ministers and favorites. The 
Janizaries, a turbulent body, often used their power to set up 
and depose sultans at will. The weakness of the central admin- 
istration was reflected in the provinces, where the pashas 
acquired substantial independence and in many instances made 
their power hereditary. Turkey's internal decadence offered a 
promising opportunity for its partition among European powers. 

Ever since the fateful year, 1683, 1 the Turks had lost ground 
in Europe, Austria soon recovered Hungary, Transylvania, 
and much of Croatia and Slavonia. Russia under Dismember- 
Catherine II seized the Crimea, with the adjoining m ent of 
territory, and under Alexander I took Bessarabia. 
The settlement of 181 5 made the Ionian Islands a British pro- 
tectorate. Then, as the nineteenth century progressed, the 
Christian peoples of the Balkans, stirred by the same enthu- 
siasm for nationality which had moved Italians, Germans, 
Belgians, Poles, and Bohemians, threw off the Ottoman yoke 
and declared for freedom. The dismemberment of Turkey 
began. 

The warlike inhabitants of Montenegro never fully accepted 

Ottoman sovereignty. A corner of the "Black _, 

J Montenegro 

Mountain" country held out for four hundred 

years against the Turks. The independence of Montenegro as 

1 See page 308. 



532 The Continental Countries 

a principality was finally recognized by the sultan in 1799. In 

1 9 10 it became a kingdom. 

The Serbians have a memorable history. In the fourteenth 

century one of their rulers, Stephen Dushan, built up an empire 

„ . '. which covered nearly the entire Balkan Peninsula. 

Serbia J 

It was Dushan's ambition to unite Serbians, Greeks, 

and Bulgarians, and by their union to prevent the Ottoman 
power from taking root in southeastern Europe. His empire 
collapsed as a result of the battle of Kossovo (1389), and for 
the next four hundred years Serbia lay under the heel of the 
Turk. All this time its people never forgot their glorious past. 
The exploits of Dushan and other national heroes were handed 
down by minstrels, who kept alive the memory of the days 
when Serbia held first place in the Balkans. After two revolts 
early in the nineteenth century the country received self-govern- 
ment as a principality. It became a kingdom in 1882. 

The Greeks had not been a free people since their conquest 
by the Romans in the second century B.C. Byzantines, crusad- 
ing Franks, and Venetians occupied Greece during 
medieval times. By the middle of the fifteenth cen- 
tury the entire country came under the Turks, whose dominion 
endured until the nineteenth century had run one-quarter of 
its course. The French Revolution awakened the longing of 
the Greeks for independence, and in 1821 they raised the stand- 
ard of revolt. Volunteers from every European country, as 
well as a few Americans, came to help them. The powers at 
first stood coldly by, for Metternich, the presiding genius of 
the Concert of Europe, considered the Greeks simply rebels 
against "legitimate" Ottoman authority. As the struggle 
proceeded and the Greeks seemed likely to be overwhelmed, 
public opinion in Great Britain and France increasingly favored 
intervention, and the accession of Nicholas I brought to the 
throne a tsar ready to follow the traditional Russian policy 
toward the Turks. The three powers finally took decisive 
action. An allied fleet destroyed the Turkish navy at Navarino, 
a French army drove the Turks out of the Morea, and the Rus- 
sians, crossing the Balkans, moved upon Constantinople. The 



The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 533 



sultan had to yield, and in 1829 signed a treaty which granted 
complete independence to central and southern Greece. 

The kingdom of Greece, as originally established, com- 
prised only a small part of ancient Hellas. More than half of 
the Greek people remained under Turkish rule, p an _ 
distributed in Thessaly, Epirus, Macedonia, Thrace, Hellenism 
the Ionian Islands, the islands of the JEgean, Crete, Cyprus, 
and the western coast 
of Asia Minor (the 
classic Ionia ) . A Pan- 
Hellenic movement 
soon began to recover 
as much as possible of 
these regions from the 
Turks. Great Britain 
fostered it by ceding 
the Ionian Islands, 
and also by inducing 
the sultan to relin- 
quish Thessaly. The 
Balkan Wars of 19 1 2- 
19 13, which will be 
described presently, 
gave Greece southern 
Epirus, a valuable part 
of Macedonia, Crete, 
and many smaller 
islands. When the 
World War broke out 
and Turkey sided with 
the Central Powers, it 
was the hope of the Greek premier, Venizelos, that Greece might 
now completely realize her Pan-Hellenic ambitions by entering 
the struggle on the side of the Allies. 

Twenty-five years after the winning of Greek freedom, 
Nicholas I, who often spoke of the sultan as the "sick man" 
of Europe and of his approaching funeral, reopened the Eastern 




" What Nicholas Heard in the Shell " 

A cartoon by Sir John Tenniel which appeared in the 
English journal Punch for June 10, 1854. The tsar is 
shown holding a bombshell to his ear and, as he listens 
to it (as children do to sea shells), having a vision of 
armed men. 



534 



The Continental Countries 



Question by invading Turkey. The result was the Crimean 
War. The Turks did not fight alone. Great Britain supported 
Crimean War, them because of the fear that the downfall of the 
1854-1856 Ottoman Empire would be followed by Russian 
occupation of Constantinople and Russian control of the eastern 

Mediterranean, thus menacing 
British communications with 
India. France joined Great 
Britain, principally because 
the adventurous Napoleon III, 
who had recently become 
emperor, wished to pay off 
the grudges against Russia 
which Napoleon I had ac- 
cumulated. 1 Count Cavour 
and Victor Emmanuel II 
added the Sardinian kingdom 
to the alliance, in order to 
further their plans for the uni- 
fication of Italy. 2 The Rus- 
sians fought alone, for both 
Austria and Prussia preserved 
neutrality. The war was 
mainly confined to the Crimea, 
where the allies sought to 
capture Sevastopol, Russia's 
naval base on the Black Sea. 
Florence Nightingale After its fall Russia withdrew 

Miss Florence Nightingale (1820-1010) did from the unequal contest. 

remarkable work during the Crimean War for The Deace treatv Save a 

the relief of sick and wounded British soldiers. ' . u r\ 

To her self-sacrificing labors are also due many new lease Of life tO the UttO- 

improvements in hospital management, sanita- T>reatv of man Empire. The 

tion, and the training of nurses. T> a ^o iorc 1 

fans, .looo p 0wers guaranteed 

the integrity of the sultan's possessions, only exacting from him 

promises of freedom of worship and better government for 

his Christian subjects. The promises were never kept ; and the 

1 See page 447. " See page 451. 




The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 535 

lot of Christians in Turkey became harder than ever. In their 
desire to keep Russia out of Constantinople, Great Britain and 
France thus abandoned the tradition, which had come down from 
the crusades, that the Turks were a barbarous people and the 
enemies of civilization. Turkey was to be treated henceforth 
as no longer outside the pale, but as a respectable member of 
the European family of nations. 

The dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire recommenced 
soon after the Treaty of Paris. Turkey's principalities of Mol- 
davia and Walla chia had been semi-independent „ 

1 Rumania 

under a Russian protectorate since 1829. They 
command the lower Danube, and their acquisition would have 
enabled Russia to control the navigation of the most important 
river of Europe. Consequently, the diplomats at Paris con- 
verted Moldavia and Wallachia into self-governing states, with 
Turkey as their nominal overlord. The Rumanians, who 
inhabit both principalities, desired, however, to form a united 
nation. The powers and the sultan gave a grudging consent, 
and the new state of Rumania came into existence. 

Russia's desire to rescue the Christians of the Balkans from 
oppression and, incidentally, to take Constantinople, brought 
about another war between the two countries. r usso . 
Sufficient justification for it existed in the cruelty Turkish War, 
with which Turkish soldiers had suppressed an 
insurrection of the Bulgarians. This time western Europe re- 
mained neutral and watched the duel between Slav and Turk. 
Russian armies promptly crossed the Danube, only to be held 
up for months before the fortress of Plevna in Bulgaria. The 
Turks fought well, and their defense of Plevna is celebrated in 
military annals. Its fall allowed the tsar's troops to advance 
within sight of the Golden Horn. Here they paused, for both 
Great Britain and Austria-Hungary threatened hostilities, in 
case Russia occupied Constantinople. 

Russia and Turkey now made peace. By the treaty of San 
Stefano 1 the sultan agreed to the creation of a new state, 
Greater Bulgaria, stretching from the Danube to the iEgean 

1 A suburb of Constantinople. 



536 The Continental Countries 

and including nearly all Macedonia. Both Greece and Serbia 
protested vigorously against this arrangement, which upset their 
Treaty of own pl ans for expansion in the Balkans. Far more 
San stefano, serious was the opposition of the Western powers. 
Austria did not relish the idea of a strong Balkan 
state lying across her path to the Mediterranean, while Great 
Britain feared that Greater Bulgaria would be merely the will- 
ing tool of Russia. A general European conflict threatened, 
until the tsar agreed to submit the treaty to revision by an 
international congress to be held at Berlin, under Bismarck's 
presidency. 

The assembled diplomats attempted still another solution of 
the Eastern Question. The Treaty of Berlin recognized Monte- 
Treaty of negro, Serbia, and Rumania as sovereign states, 
Berlin, 1878 w h Hy independent of Turkey. That part of Bul- 
garia between the Danube and the Balkans became a self- 
governing principality under Turkish sovereignty. Bulgaria 
south of the Balkans — Eastern Rumelia — went back to the 
sultan, together with Macedonia. Austria-Hungary was allowed 
to occupy and administer the Turkish provinces of Bosnia and 
Herzegovina. Great Britain was given the right to hold the 
island of Cyprus. These arrangements having been made, the 
powers again solemnly guaranteed the " integrity" of the sul- 
tan's remaining possessions in Europe. The Ottoman Empire 
thus remained in Europe, a decadent empire propped up by 
Christian arms. 

Diplomacy did not bring peace to the Balkans. The inhabit- 
ants of Eastern Rumelia before long revolted against the Turks 
_ . and united with Bulgaria. The European powers 

protested against this infraction of the Berlin treaty, 
but took no measures to prevent the union of the two Bulgarian 
territories. Bulgaria remained tributary to the sultan until 
1908. By that time she had grown strong enough to repudiate 
another clause of the Berlin treaty and to set up as an inde- 
pendent kingdom. Her ruler, Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, then 
exchanged his princely dignity for the more pretentious title 
of tsar of the Bulgarians. 



The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 537 

The year 1908 saw also a revolution in the sultan's dominions. 
This was the work of the Young Turks, a group of patriotic 
reformers who aimed to revive and modernize the The Young 
Ottoman Empire. They won over the army and Turks 
carried through a sudden, almost bloodless, coup d'etat. The 
terrified sultan (Abdul Hamid II) had to issue a decree re- 
storing the constitution' granted by him at his accession, 
but abrogated soon afterwards. His despotism, vanished, and 
the Ottoman Empire, with an elective parliament, a responsi- 
ble ministry, and a free press took a place among democratic 
states. 

It soon became evident, however, that the Young Turks were 
nationalists as well as democrats. They intended to weld 
together all the peoples of the Ottoman Empire ottoman- 
into a single nation, with Turkish as the favored lzatlon 
language and Islam the only privileged faith. Just as the 
Russian policy was one of Russification, so that of the Young 
Turks was one of Ottomanization. Cruel oppression and 
massacres of Christians in various parts of the empire followed, 
particularly in Macedonia. This Turkish province was peopled 
by Greeks, Serbians, and Bulgarians. Large numbers of them 
fled to their respective countries, carrying their grievances with 
them, and agitated for war against Turkey. 

The war soon came. Greece, Montenegro, Serbia, and Bul- 
garia, forgetting for the moment the jealousies which divided 

them, came together in a Balkan alliance, issued „,. 

' First and 

to the sultan an ultimatum demanding self- Second Bal- 

government for Macedonia, and when this was ^"^"^ 
° ' 1912-1913 

refused, promptly began hostilities. They were 

everywhere successful, and Turkey was compelled to give up 

all her European dominions west of a line drawn from Enos 

on the ^gean Sea to Midia on the Black Sea. She likewise 

ceded Crete to Greece. The allies then proceeded to quarrel 

over the disposition of Macedonia. A second Balkan War 

resulted, with Greece, Serbia, Montenegro, Rumania, and 

Turkey ranged against Bulgaria. Tsar Ferdinand could not 

cope with so many foes and sued for peace. 



538 



The Continental Countries 

European Governments 



Country 


Capital 


Ruler 


Parliament 


Albania . . . 


Durazzo 






Austria . . . 


Vienna 


President M. 
Hainisch 




Belgium . . . 


Brussels 


Albert H1909-) 


Senate and Chamber of Representa- 
tives 


Bulgaria . . . 


Sofia 


Boris III (1918-) 


National Assembly or Sobranje 


Czecho- 


Prague 


President T. G. 


Senate and Chamber of Deputies 


slovakia . . 




Masaryk 




Denmark . . . 


Copenhagen 


Christian X 


Rigsdad (Landsthing and Folkething) 


Esthonia . . . 


Reval 


(191 2—) 




Finland . . . 


Helsingfors 


President K. J. 
Stahlberg 


House of Representatives 


France . . . 


Paris 


President A. 
Millerand 


Senate and Chamber of Deputies 


Germany . . . 


Berlin 


President F. 
Ebert 


Bundesrat and Reichstag 


Great Britain 


London 


George V (1910-) 


House of Lords and House of Com- 
mons 


Greece . . . 


Athens 


Constantine I 


Bule (Council of State and Chamber of 






(1913-1917, 


Deputies) 






1920-) 




Holland . . . 


The Hague 


Wilhelmina 


Estates-General (First Chamber and 






(1890-) 


Second Chamber) 


Hungary . . . 


Budapest 






Iceland . . . 


Reykjavik 


Christian X 


Althing (Upper House and Lower 






(1912-) 


House) 


Italy .... 


Rome 


Victor Emmanue 
III (1900-) 


Senate and Chamber of Deputies 


Jugoslavia . . 


Belgrade 


Alexander I 


National Assembly or Naroda Skup- 






(1919-) 


shtina 


Latvia. . . . 


Riga 






Lithuania . . 


Vilna 


President A. 
Smetona 




Norway . . . 


Christiania 


Haakon VII 
(1905-) 


Storthing (Lagthing and Odelsthing) 


Poland . . . 


Warsaw- 


President J. 
Pilsudski 


Parliament or Seym 


Portugal . . 


Lisbon 


President A. 
Almeida 


National Council and Second Chamber 


Rumania . . . 


Bukharest 


Ferdinand I 


Senate and Chamber of Deputies 


Russia. . . . 


Moscow 


(1914-) 




Spain .... 


Madrid 


Alfonso XIII 
(1886-) 


Cortes (Senate and Congress) 


Sweden . . . 


Stockholm 


Gustav V 


Diet (First Chamber and Second 






(1907-) 


Chamber) 


Switzerland 


Berne 




Standerat and Nationalrat 


Turkey . . . 


Constantinople 


Mohammed VI 
(1918-) 


Senate and Chamber of Deputies 


Ukrainia . . . 


Kiev 







The treaty signed at Bukharest completely altered the aspect 
of the Balkans. Bulgaria surrendered to Rumania districts 



The Ottoman Empire and the Balkan States 539 

south of the Danube, and allowed Greece, Montenegro, and 
Serbia to annex most of Macedonia. These three states were 
now nearly doubled in size. The Turkish province Treaty of 
of Albania became an independent principality. Bukharest, 
Turkey, though ignored at the Peace Conference, 
escaped dismemberment and even secured an accession of terri- 
tory. The Treaty of Bukharest thus left the Turk in Europe, 
and by sowing seeds of enmity between Bulgaria and her sister 
states helped further to postpone a satisfactory solution of the 
Eastern Question. 

Studies 

1. Contrast the circumstances under which the Third Republic came into exist- 
ence with those leading to the organization of the First and Second Republics. 

2. Why may the French government be described as a "parliamentary republic"? 

3. Compare the powers of the French and American presidents, respectively. 4. 
How does the party system of France differ from that of Great Britain? 5. Why 
is the pope called the "prisoner of the Vatican"? 6. How does Spain happen to 
have a Bourbon dynasty? 7. "The disappearance of the Spanish colonial empire 
is one of the most significant features of the nineteenth century." Comment on 
this statement. 8. When did Switzerland become a neutralized state? 9. Com- 
pare the Swiss referendum with the French plebiscite. 10. Compare the German 
Empire as a federation with the United States. 11. What was the historical origin 
of the free cities of the German Empire? 12. Explain the distinction between the 
titles " German Emperor" and "Emperor of Germany." 13. Why was the Reichstag 
described by its own members as merely a " hall of echoes"? 14. Why was Germany 
called the "political kindergarten of Europe"? 15. Why was the Austrian Em- 
pire called a "ramshackle empire"? 16. Why has Russia been called the "adopted 
child" of Europe? 17. Why was the character and personality of the tsars always 
an important factor in Russian history? 18. Comment on the tsar's title "Auto- 
crat of all the Russias." 19. What was meant by calling the Russian imperial 
government a "despotism tempered by assassination"? 20. Account for the slow 
progress of liberalism in Russia. 21. "The two forces that have constantly un- 
dermined the power of Turkey are religion and nationality." How does Turkish 
history during the last hundred years confirm this statement? 22. Mention three 
occasions in the nineteenth century when the Ottoman Empire seemed to be on the 
point of dissolution. 23. Why did Russia favor nationalism in the Balkans and 
oppose it in other parts of Europe? 24. Explain the strategic value of Constan- 
tinople. 25. Why has the Balkan Peninsula been called the "danger zone" of 
Europe? 



CHAPTER XVI 
COLONIAL EXPANSION AND WORLD POLITICS 1 

141. Greater Europe 

Colonial expansion, begun by Spaniards and Portuguese 
in the sixteenth century and continued in the seventeenth and 
Expansion of eighteenth centuries by Russians, Dutch, French, 
Europe an( j Engijg]^ culminated during the past hundred- 

odd years. It is principally this movement which gives such 
significance to European history. The civilization of Europe, 
as affected by the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Revo- 
lution, has been spread throughout the world. The languages, 
literatures, religions, laws, and customs of Europe have been 
extended to almost all mankind. 

Great Britain in 1815 was the leading world power. France 
had been well-nigh eliminated as a colonial rival by the Seven 
Colonial Years' War, and Holland had lost valuable pos- 

empires sessions overseas in the revolutionary and Napo- 

leonic wars. The spectacle of the British Empire, so populous, 
so rich in natural resources, so far-flung, stirred the imagination 
and aroused the envy of the witnessing nations. They, also, 
became eager for possessions in savage or half-civilized lands. 
France, from the time of Louis Philippe, began to conquer 
northwestern Africa and Madagascar and to acquire territories 
in southeastern Asia. Italy and Germany, having attained 
nationhood, entered into the race for overseas dominions. 
Portugal and Spain annexed new colonies. Diminutive Bel- 
gium built up a colonial empire in Africa. Mighty Russia 

1 Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 19, "Washington's Farewell Address, 
1796"; No. 21, "Monroe Doctrine, 1823"; No. 23, "Durham Report, 1839"; 
No. 26, "Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, 1861 "; No. 27, "Gettysburg Address, 
1863"; No. 30, "Roosevelt's Inaugural Address, 1905." 

54° 



Greater Europe 541 

spread out eastward over the whole of Siberia and, having 
reached the Pacific, moved southward toward the warmer 
waters of the Indian Ocean. Meanwhile, the United States 
expanded across the American continent, acquired the Philip- 
pines and other dependencies, and stood forth at length as an 
imperial power. Few and unimportant were those regions of 
the world which remained unappropriated at the opening of the 
twentieth century. 

The word "imperialism" conveniently describes all this 
activity of the different nations in reaching out for colonial 

dependencies. Imperialism, of course, is not a r 

r r , Imperialism 

new phenomenon; empire building began almost 
at the dawn of history. We are concerned here only with its 
most recent aspects. Sometimes it leads to the declaration 
of a protectorate over a region, or, perhaps, to the marking off 
a sphere of influence where other powers agree not to interfere. 
Sometimes it goes no further than the securing of concessions 
in undeveloped countries such as Mexico, Brazil, or China. 
Most commonly, however, imperialism results in the complete 
annexation of a distant territory, with or without the consent 
of the inhabitants. 

The imperialistic ambitions of the great powers more than 
once led them to disregard the rights of weaker nations in 
Africa, Asia, and other parts of the world. Thus, im per i a ii sm 
Great Britain subdued the two Boer republics in and 
South Africa, Italy attempted to conquer the 
independent nation of Abyssinia, and Great Britain, France, 
Germany, and Russia at one time threatened the integrity of 
China. It should be said, however, that in most cases colonial 
dependencies have been secured only at the expense of savage 
or semi-civilized peoples. Though there are many things to 
condemn in the conduct of the European powers toward their 
subjects, much improvement is to be observed within recent 
years. Great Britain, France, and other colonial states expend 
large sums annually in their dominions for roads, railways, 
schools, medical service, and humanitarian work of various 
sorts. 



542 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

It has been manifestly impossible for even the most demo- 
cratic of modern nations to grant self-government to their rude 
Imperialism an( ^ backward subjects. Where the level of civili- 
and zation is higher, as in Egypt and India, the pre- 

emocracy vailing illiteracy of the inhabitants forms a great 
obstacle in the way of democracy. We have already noted, 
however, that Great Britain during the last century raised round 
herself a circle of self-governing daughters in Canada, Australia, 
and South Africa, and that France permits some of her colonies 
to send representatives to the French legislature. 1 Other in- 
stances of the bestowal of free institutions upon native peoples 
will be referred to as we proceed with the story of European 
expansion in Africa and Asia. 

142. The Opening-up of Africa 

Speaking broadly, Africa consists of an elevated plateau 
with a fringe of unindented coastal plain. Penetration of the 
Physical interior was long delayed by mountain ranges 

Africa which approach close to the sea, by rapids and 

falls which hinder river navigation, by the barrier of dense 
forests and extensive deserts, and by the unhealthiness of 
the climate in many regions. Though lying almost in sight 
of Europe, Africa remained until our own time the "Dark 
Continent." 

Many different peoples have found a home in Africa. All 
the northern part of the continent is occupied by the White 
Racial Race, divided into the three great groups of 

Africa Semites (Arabs), Eastern Hamites, and Western 

Hamites, or Libyans. The Black Race since prehistoric times 
has held the rest of the continent. The true negroes are con- 
fined to the Sudan and adjacent parts. Some negroes in the 
course of time blended more or less with Hamites, giving rise to 
the Bantu-speaking peoples, who dwell chiefly south of the 
equator. To these elements of the native population must be 
added the curious Pygmies of the equatorial districts, together 
with the Hottentots and Bushmen in the extreme south. 

1 See pages 494 and 504 



The Opening-up of Africa 



543 




Little more than the Mediterranean shore of Africa was 
known in antiquity. Here were Egypt, the first home of 
civilization, and Carthage, Rome's most formidable rival for 
supremacy. During the earlier Middle Ages all North Africa 
fell under Arab domination. Arab missionaries, warriors, and 



544 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 



slave-hunters also spread along the eastern coast and estab- 
lished trading posts as far south as the mouth of the Zambesi 

River. The vast extent of the continent was 
Africa until 
the nine- first revealed to Europeans by the Portuguese 

teenth cen- discoveries in the second half of the fifteenth 
tury 

century. 1 Except for the Dutch colony at the 

Cape of Good Hope, Europeans, however, did not try to settle 
in Africa. Nothing tempted them to do so. The shores of the 
continent were plague-ridden, and its interior was supposed to 
consist of barren deserts or of impenetrable forests. Maps of 

Africa a hundred years ago show 
the interior decorated with pic- 
tures of the hippopotamus, the 
elephant, and the negro, to 
conceal the ignorance of geogra- 
phers. 

The penetration of Africa has 
been mainly accomplished by 
The Niger following the course 
of its four great 
rivers. In the last 
decade of the eighteenth century 
the British African Association, 
then recently founded, sent 
Mungo Park to the Niger. He 
and his immediate successors 
explored the basin of that river and revealed the existence 
of the mysterious city of Timbuktu, an Arab capital never 
previously visited by Europeans. The determination of the 
sources of the Nile — a problem which had interested the an- 
cients — met with success shortly after the middle of the 
nineteenth century. Captain Speke first saw the waters of the 
lake which he named Victoria Nyanza, in honor of England's 
queen, and Sir Samuel Baker found the smaller lake called by 
him Albert Nyanza, in honor of the Prince Consort. The dis- 
covery of snow-clad mountains in this part of Africa confirmed 

1 See page 251. 




and the 
Nile basins 



David Livingstone 



The Opening-up of Africa 



545 




what Greek geographers had taught regarding the "Mountains 
of the Moon." 

Meanwhile, an intrepid Scotch missionary and explorer, 
David Livingstone, had traced the course of the Zambesi. 



546 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 



Starting from the Cape, he worked his way northward, found 
the wonderful Victoria Falls, and crossed the continent from 
Basins of the sea to sea - Livingstone's work was carried further 
Zambesi and by Henry M. Stanley, a newspaper correspond- 
ent who became one of the eminent explorers 
of modern times. He discovered Lake Albert Edward Nyanza, 
showed that Lake Tanganyika drained into the Congo, and 
followed that mighty stream all the way to its mouth. Stan- 
ley's fascinating narra- 
tives of his travels did 
much to arouse Euro- 
pean interest in Africa. 
Mission work in Af- 
rica went hand in hand 
African with geograph- 
missions \ ca \ discovery. 
Not a great deal has 
been accomplished in 
North Africa, where Is- 
lam is supreme from 
Morocco to Egypt and 
from the Mediterra- 
nean to io° north of the 
equator. Abyssinia, the 
negro republic of Libe- 
ria, and South Africa, as far as it is white, are entirely Chris- 
tian. The accompanying map shows how mission stations, 
both Roman Catholic and Protestant, have been planted 
throughout the broad belt of heathenism in Central Africa. 



a 




Iff- Vfj 






r 



1 



Henry M. Stanley 

After a photograph taken in iS 



143. The Partition of Africa 

The division of Africa among European powers followed 

promptly upon its exploration. Spain, Portugal, Belgium, 

The Spanish Germany, Italy, France, and Great Britain all 

and Portu- profited by the scramble for African territory, 
guese in . , , , . ..... n , , . 

Africa particularly during the 'eighties and the nineties 

of the last century. The Spanish possessions are small, 



The Partition of Africa 547 

compared with those of the other powers, and, except for 
the northern coast of Morocco, not of great importance. Por- 
tugal, however, controls the two valuable regions of Angola 
and Mozambique. 

The Congo basin, in the heart of the Dark Continent, is 
controlled by Belgium. The area of the Belgian The Belgians 
Congo has now been considerably increased by m Afnca 
the acquisition of former German territories. 

Soon after Germany attained national unity, she made her 
appearance among colonial powers. Treaties with the native 
chiefs and arbitrary annexations resulted in the The Germans 
acquisition of extensive regions in Southwest in Afnca 
Africa, East Africa, the Cameroons, and Togo. They were all 
conquered by the Allies during the World War. 

Italy was another late-comer on the African scene. She 
secured Eritrea on the Red Sea and Italian Somaliland. An 
Italian attempt to annex Abyssinia ended, dis- The Italians 
astrously, and the ancient Abyssinian "empire" in Africa 
still remains independent. Italy's most important African 
colony is Libya, conquered from Turkey in 1911-1912. It says 
much for the liberal principles underlying Italian colonial policy 
that a constitution has recently been granted to the Libyans. 

The beginnings of French dominion in Africa reach back to 
the seventeenth century, when Louis XIV began to acquire 
trading posts along the western coast and in The French 
Madagascar. It was not until the nineteenth m Afnca 
century, however, that the French entered seriously upon the 
work of colonization. France now holds Algeria, the conquest 
of which began in 1830; Tunis, taken from Turkey in 1881 ; 
most of Morocco, a protectorate since 191 2 ; the valleys of the 
Senegal and Upper Niger ; part of the Guinea coast ; French 
Somaliland ; and the island ot Madagascar. A glance at the 
map shows that the African possessions of France exceed in area 
those of any other power, but they include the Sahara Desert. 

Great Britain has secured, if not the lion's share, at any rate 
the most valuable share of Africa. Besides extensive posses- 
sions on the Guinea coast, she holds a solid block of territory 



548 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 



all the way from the Cape of Good Hope to Egypt. Cape 
Colony was captured from the Dutch during the Napoleonic 
The British wars. The Dutch farmers, or Boers, did not take 
in South kindly to British rule. Many of them, with their 

families and flocks, moved from Cape Colony 
into the unknown country beyond. This wholesale emigration 
resulted in the formation of the Boer republics of Natal, Orange 
Free State, and the Transvaal. Natal was soon annexed by 
Great Britain, but the other two republics remained independent. 

The discovery of the world's 
richest gold mines in the Trans- 
vaal led to a large influx of 
Englishmen, who, since they 
paid taxes, demanded a share in 
the government. The champion 
of British interests was Cecil 
Rhodes, an Oxford student who 
j*^ found riches in the Kimberley 
% diamond fields and rose to be 
prime minister of Cape Colony. 
The Dutch settlers, under the 
lead of President Kruger of the 
Transvaal, were just as deter- 
mined to keep the government 
in their own hands. Disputes 
between the two peoples culminated in the South African War 
(1899-1902), in which the Boers were overcome by sheer 
weight of numbers. 

The war had a happy outcome. Great Britain showed a 
wise liberality toward her former foes and granted them self- 
Union of government. Cape Colony, Natal, Orange Free 
South Africa, State, and the Transvaal soon came together in 
1909-1910 the Union of South Africa> The union has a 

governor-general appointed by the British Crown, a common 
parliament, and a responsible ministry. Cape Town and 
Pretoria are the two capitals, and both English and Dutch are 
official languages. 




LLGEmAJjTT 
i r/z ) 7 %• \^\< ?! 'T S V. TriDoli 

|oroc£o,^ TugRUrt \ \ 5>^Xn S 

/lorocco } . bfe v..T/ V_ 

n t I tit .■;./•.•'.•' \i/ TRIPOLITANIA V 

CANARY IS.^ Ifn j/",,„daB^" ^ .:/ " .*V.-'iv • 1 LIB 





' Good Hope 



The Partition of Africa 549 

The Union may ultimately include other British possessions 
in Africa. Great Britain asserts a protectorate over Bechuana- 
land, which is still very sparsely settled by Euro- The British 
peans. She also controls the imperial domain m East Afnca 
acquired by Cecil Rhodes and called after him Rhodesia. 
During the World War loyal Boers conquered German South- 
west Africa and cooperated with the British in the conquest of 
German East Africa. Great Britain has still other territories 
in this part of the Dark Continent. The Anglo-Egyptian 
Sudan, comprising the region of the Upper Nile, was secured 
in the last decade of the nineteenth century, as the result of 
General Kitchener's victorious campaigns. 

The Egyptians have been subject to foreigners for over 

twenty-four hundred years. The Persians came to Egypt in 

the sixth centurv B.C. : then the Macedonians ,, 

Egypt 
under Alexander the Great ; then the Romans 

under Julius Caesar ; and subsequently the Arabs and the 
Ottoman Turks. Turkish sultans controlled the country until 
the early part of the nineteenth century, when an able pasha 
made himself almost an independent sovereign. After 1882 
Egypt was ruled by Great Britain. Once established in Egypt, 
the British began to make it over. They restored order, puri- 
fied the courts, levied taxes fairly, reorganized the finances, 
paid the public debt, abolished forced labor, and took measures 
to improve sanitary conditions. British engineers built a rail- 
road along the Nile, together with the famous Assuan Dam 
and other irrigation works which reclaimed millions of acres 
from the desert. For the first time in centuries, the peasants 
were assured of peace, justice, and an opportunity to make a 
decent living. Nevertheless, economic prosperity did not 
reconcile the people to foreign rule. In 1920, after much 
agitation and revolutionary outbreaks, Great Britain finally 
conceded the independence of Egypt. The British, however, 
retain control of the foreign relations of that country. 

The strategic importance of Egypt as the doorway to Africa 
will be much increased by the completion of the Cape-to-Cairo 
Railway. This transcontinental line starts from Cape Town, 



550 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 



Cairo 
Railway 



Suez Canal 



crosses Bechuanaland and Rhodesia, and will ultimately link 
up with the railway already in operation between Khartum, 
Cape-to- Cairo, and Alexandria on the Mediterranean. The 

unfinished part is mainly in the Congo region. 
The Cape-to-Cairo Railway owes its inspiration 
to Cecil Rhodes, who dreamed of an "all-red" route across 
Africa, and then with characteristic pluck and energy set out 

to make his dream come 
true. 

The completion of the 
Suez Canal has likewise 
put Egypt 
on the main 
oceanic highway to the 
Far East. The canal is 
a monument to the great 
French engineer, Ferdi- 
nand de Lesseps. It 
was opened to traffic in 
1869. The money for 
the undertaking came 
chiefly from European in- 
vestors. Great Britain 
possesses a controlling interest in the enterprise. The canal, how- 
ever, may be freely used by the ships of all nations. More than 
half of the voyages from Europe to the Far East are now made 
through the canal rather than round the Cape of Good Hope. 




MmiWKfiWPii, 
Count Ferdinand de Lesseps 



144. The Opening-up and Partition of Asia 

The Europeanization of Asia was not far advanced at the 
beginning of the nineteenth century. Europe knew only 
Europe and Siberia, which Russia had appropriated, and those 
Asia parts of India which had been annexed by Great 

Britain. All western Asia belonged to the Ottoman Empire 
and remained unaffected by European influence. On the eastern 
side of the continent lay China and Japan, old and civilized 
but stagnant countries, whose backs were turned upon the rest 



The Opening-up and Partition of Asia 551 

of the world. Within the past hundred years, however, Euro- 
pean traders, missionaries, and soldiers have broken through 
the barriers raised by Oriental' peoples,- and now almost the 
whole of Asia is either politically or economically dependent 
upon Europe. 

The Russians were established throughout Siberia before the 
close of the seventeenth century. Their advance over this 
enormous but thinly peopled region was facilitated Russia in 
by its magnificent rivers, which furnished high- northern Asia 
ways for explorers and fur traders. Northern Siberia is a 
waste of swamp and tundra, where the terrible climate blocks 
the mouths of the streams with ice and even in summer keeps 
the ground frozen beneath the surface. Farther south comes 
a great belt of forest, the finest timbered area still intact on the 
face of the earth, and still farther south extend treeless steppes 
adapted in part to agriculture and in part to herding. The 
country also contains much mineral wealth. In order to secure 
an outlet for Siberian products, Russia compelled China to cede 
the lower Amur Valley with the adjoining seacoast. The 
Russians in their newly acquired territory founded Vladivostok 
as a naval base. 

Vladivostok is also the eastern terminus of the Trans-Siberian 
Railway. The western terminus is Petrograd, three thousand 
miles distant. The railway was completed in The x rans . 

iooo by the imperial government, partly to facili- Siberian 
., . . .,., Railway 

tate the movement of troops and military sup- 
plies in Siberia and partly to develop that region as a home 
for Russian emigrants and a market for Russian manufactures. 
A branch line extends to Port Arthur, which, unlike Vladivostok, 
is an ice-free harbor on the Pacific. 

Russia also widened her boundaries in central Asia by absorb- 
ing Turkestan east of the Caspian and south of Lake Balkash 
and the Aral Sea. Alarmed by the steady progress Russia and 
southward of the Russian colossus, Great Britain Great Britain 
began to extend the northern and northwestern £ si " ntral 
frontiers of India, in order to secure a mountain 
barrier for her Indian possessions. Half a century of feverish 



552 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

fears and restless advances on both sides was ended by the 

Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907. It dealt with Persia, 

Afghanistan, and Tibet. 

The Persian kingdom became a buffer state between Russia 

and Great Britain. The northern part of Persia was recog- 

„ . nized as a Russian sphere of influence, the southern 

Persia . ^ > 

part as a British sphere, and the central part as a 

neutral zone where the two powers pledged themselves not to 

interfere except by mutual consent. The unsettled conditions 

arising out of the World War enabled Persia to rid herself of 

Russian control. With Great Britain she has concluded a new 

agreement, by which the former power guarantees the security 

of the Persian frontiers and promises assistance in developing 

Persian trade and industries. 

The kingdom of Afghanistan also became a buffer state. 

Great Britain engaged not to annex any of its territory, while 

.. . . , Russia, on her side, agreed to regard it as within 
Afghanistan ; ' ° ° 

the British sphere of influence and under British 
protection. Though a very mountainous region, Afghanistan 
contains numerous passes, over which in historic times con- 
quering peoples have repeatedly descended into India. 

The Chinese dependency of Tibet was little known until a 
few years ago, when a British military expedition penetrated 

_.. , to the sacred city of Lhasa and obtained conces- 

Tibet ,.i -i 

sions for trade within the country. Russia also 

professed to be interested in Tibet. By the Anglo-Russian Con- 
vention both nations promised to respect its territorial integrity 
and not to interfere with Chinese sovereignty over the country. 
Indo-China, except for the nominally independent state 
of Siam, is now under British and French control. Great 

„ . . Britain holds Burma and the Straits Settlements. 
Great Britain 

and France in France holds Tonkin, Anam, Laos, Cambodia, 

southeastern an( ^ Cochin-China. All these possessions have 
Asia c 

been acquired at the expense of China, which 

formerly exercised a vague sovereignty over southeastern Asia. 

Siam occupies a position comparable to that of Persia. By 

an agreement between Great Britain and France in 1896, the 



India 553 

country was divided into three zones: the eastern to be the 

French sphere of influence; the western to be the British 

sphere of influence ; and the central to be neutral. „. 

Siam 

It will be thus seen that a belt of protected or neu- 
tral states — Afghanistan, Persia, Tibet, and Siam — separates 
the possessions of Russia and France in Asia from those of Great 
Britain and forms the real frontier of India. 

145. India 

British expansion in India, begun by Clive during the Seven 
Years' War, 1 has proceeded scarcely without interruption 
to the present day. The conquest of India was Conquest 
almost inevitable. Sometimes the Indian princes of India 
attacked the British settlements and had to be overcome; 
sometimes the lawless condition of their dominions led to inter- 
vention; sometimes, again, the need of finding defensible 
frontiers resulted in annexations. The entire peninsula, cover- 
ing an area half as large as the United States, is now under the 
Union Jack. 

The East India Company continued to govern India until 
after the middle of the nineteenth century. In 1857 came the 
Sepoy Mutiny, a sudden uprising of the native Government 
soldiers in the northern part of the country. of India 
The mutiny disclosed the weakness of company rule and at 
once led to the transfer of all governmental functions to the 
Crown. Queen Victoria subsequently assumed the title, 
Empress of India. A viceroy, whose seat is the old Mogul 
capital Delhi, and the officials of the Indian Civil Service ad- 
minister the affairs of about two-thirds of the country. The 
remainder is ruled by native princes under British control. 

The fact that a handful of foreigners has been able to subdue 
and keep in subjection more than three hundred million Indian 
peoples is sufficiently explained by their disunion. Peoples of 
There are many racial types, speaking upwards of India 
fifty distinct languages. The Aryan Hindus dwell in the river 
valleys of the Indus and the Ganges. Southern India belongs 

1 See page 327. 



554 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

chiefly to the dark-skinned Dravidians, who speak non-Aryan 
tongues and probably represent the aboriginal inhabitants of 
the peninsula. The slopes of the Himalayas are occupied by the 
descendants of Turkish (Mogul) and other invaders. On the 
northeast, reaching down into Burma, are Mongolian peoples 
allied to the Chinese. All these elements, however, have become 
inextricably mingled, and their representatives are found in 
every province and native state. 



^w/im r *-w>- 




"The Lion's Vengeance on the Bengal Tiger" 

A cartoon by Sir John Tenniel which appeared in the English journal Punch for 
August 22, 1857. , 



Religion likewise acts as a divisive force. The Hindus accept 
Brahmanism, a name derived from Brahma, the Supreme 
Religions Being or First Cause. In its original form, three 
of India thousand years ago, Brahmanism appears to have 

been an elevated faith, but it has now so far declined that 
its adherents generally worship a multitude of gods, venerate 
idols, revere the cow as a sacred animal, and indulge in many 
debasing rites. The Dravidians are only nominal Brahmanists ; 
their real worship is that of countless village deities. Islam 
prevails especially in the northern fringe of provinces, but 
Moslem missionaries have penetrated almost every part of the 
country. Buddhism, which arose out of the teaching of the 
great religious reformer, Gautama Buddha (about 568-488 







^* O A , 8 U A I «* 




China 555 

B.C.), is now practically extinct in the land of its birth, though 
Ceylon and Burma are strongholds of this ancient faith. 1 

Nor are the Hindus themselves united. The all-pervading 
caste system splits them up into several thousand distinct 
groups, headed by the Brahmans or priests. The caste 
Members of a given caste may not marry outside s y stem 
it ; may not eat with any one who does not belong to it ; and 
may not do work of any sort unrecognized by it. Caste, in fact, 
regulates a man's actions from the cradle to the grave. It has 
lasted in India for ages. 

The spread of European civilization in India promises to 
remove, or at least to lower, the barriers of race, religion, and 
caste. Great Britain enforces peace throughout Indian 
the peninsula, builds railways and canals linking nationalism 
every part of it together, stamps out the famines and plagues 
which used to decimate the inhabitants, and has begun their 
education in schools of many grades. All this tends to foster 
a sense of nationality, something hitherto lacking in India. 
Educated Hindus, familiar with the national and democratic 
movements in Europe, now demand self-government for their 
own country. This may come in time, but a united Indian 
nation must necessarily be of slow development. 

146. China 

Between Russian Asia and British and French Asia lies 

China, with a larger area than Europe and probably quite as 

populous. China proper consists of eighteen „. 

. .,',., China proper 

provinces in the fertile valleys of the Yangtse 

and the Hoangho, or Yellow River. The great length of the 

country accounts for the variety of its productions, which 

range from hardy grains in the north to camphor and mulberry 

trees, tea, and cotton in the south. The mineral wealth includes 

deposits of copper, tin, lead, and iron, much oil, and coal fields 

said to be the most extensive in the world. 

The traditions of the Chinese throw no light on their origin. 

They probably developed out of the Mongolian stock inhabiting 

1 See the map on page 556. 



556 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 




Expansion of Buddhism 

China proper. In the course of centuries they pushed into 
Th _, . Manchuria, Mongolia, Chinese Turkestan (Sin- 

kiang), Tibet, Indo-China, and Korea, until the 
greater part of eastern Asia came under Chinese influence. 

The Chinese boast a civilization already old when Rome was 
young. They are famous for artistic work in wood and metal, 
Chinese the manufacture of silk, and the production of 

civilization porcelain or chinaware. Rudimentary forms of 
such inventions as the compass, gunpowder, paper, and movable 
type were early known to them. Their cumbrous, non alpha- 
betic writing, used for thousands of years, is now to be super- 
seded by a phonetic script of thirty-nine characters. 

The government of China, until recently, had always been 
a monarchy. The emperor, in theory absolute, was really 



China 



557 



under the thumb of the office-holding or mandarin class, which 
took the place of a hereditary nobility. Any one, high or low, 
could enter its ranks by passing a rigid examination in the 
sacred books. These were in part collected and , society and 
edited by Confucius (551-478 B.C.), the reformer religion in 
who did so much to make reverence for ancestors 
and imitation of their ways the Chinaman's cardinal virtues. 
Confucianism is a code of morals rather than a religion. It has 
not supplanted among uneducated people a lively belief in 




The Great Wall of Chlna 

The wall was begun in 214 B.C. to protect the northern frontier of China from the inroads 
of Tatar tribes, and was gradually extended until it reached a length of 1500 miles. It consists 
of two ramparts of brick, resting upon granite foundations. The space within is filled with 
stones and earth. The breadth of the wall is about 25 feet; its height is between 20 and 30 
feet. Watch towers, 40 feet high, occur every 200 yards. In places of strategic importance 
there are sometimes as many as five huge loops, with miles of country between, so that if one 
loop were captured the next might still be defended. Many parts of this colossal fortification 
are even now in good repair. 

many spirits, good and bad. Buddhism has spread so widely 
over China and the adjoining countries that to-day it forms 
the creed of about one-third of mankind. Christianity and 
Islam are also making some headway in China. 

The rugged mountains and trackless deserts which bound 
three sides of China long shut it off from much isolation of 
intercourse with the western world. The proud China 
disposition of its people, to whom foreigners were only bar- 



558 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

barians ("foreign devils"), likewise tended to keep them iso- 
lated. Before the nineteenth century the only Europeans 
who gained an entrance into the "Celestial Empire" were a few 
missionaries and traders. The merchants of Portugal estab- 
lished themselves at Macao, and those of Holland and Great 
Britain at Canton. There was some traffic overland between 
Russia and China. Foreign trade, however, had no attraction 
for the Chinese, who discouraged it as far as possible. 

The difficulties experienced by merchants in China led at 
length to hostilities between that country and Great Britain. 
Foreign The British, with their modern fleet and army, 

aggression j^ an eaS y v j c tory and in 1842 compelled the 
Chinese government to open additional ports and cede the 
island of Hongkong. Other nations now hastened to secure 
commercial concessions in China. Many more ports were 
opened to foreign merchants, Europeans were granted the 
right to travel in China, and Christian missionaries were to be 
protected in their work among the inhabitants. But all this 
made little impression upon perhaps the most conservative 
people in the world. The Chinese remained absolutely hostile 
to the western civilization so rudely thrust upon them. 

Foreign aggression soon took the form of annexations in 

outlying portions of Chinese territory. We have seen how 

Great Britain appropriated Burma ; France, Indo- 
Annexations rr r 

China; and Russia, the Amur district. Mean- 
while, Japan, just beginning her national expansion, looked en- 
viously across the sea to Korea, a tributary kingdom of China. 
The Chino- Japanese War (1 894-1 895) followed. Completely 
defeated, the Chinese had not only to renounce all claim to 
Korea, but also to surrender to Japan the island of Formosa 
and the extreme southern part of Manchuria, including the 
coveted Port Arthur. At this juncture of affairs Russia, 
Germany, and France intervened and induced the Japanese to 
accept a money indemnity in lieu of territorial acquisitions on the 

mainland. The coalition then seized several Chinese harbors 1 

1 
1 Russia took Port Arthur ; Germany, Kiauchau ; and France, Kwangchauwan. 
Great Britain also acquired Weihaiwei. 



China 



559 



and divided much of the country into spheres of influence. 
The partition of China seemed at hand. 

But Europe was not to have its own way in China. A secret 
society called the "Boxers," whose members claimed to be in- 
vulnerable, spread rapidly through the provinces The 
and urged war to the death against the "foreign "Boxers," 
devils." Encouraged by the empress-dowager, 
Tze-hsi, who was regent of China for nearly forty years, the 
"Boxers" murdered many traders and missionaries. s The 
foreigners in Peking took 
refuge within the legations, 
where after a desperate de- 
fense they were finally re- 
lieved by an international 
army composed of European, 
Japanese, and American 
troops. The allies then made 
peace with China and prom- 
ised henceforth to respect 
her territory. They insisted, 
however, on the payment of 
a large indemnity for the out- 
rages committed during the 
anti-foreign outbreak. 

Events now moved rapidly. 
Educated Chinese, many of 
whom had studied abroad, 
saw clearly that their coun- 
try must adopt The Chinese 
western ideas Revolution, 
1912 

and methods, if 
it was to remain a great 
power. The demand for 
thorough reforms in the government soon became a revo- 
lutionary propaganda, directed against the unprogressive 
Manchu (or Manchurian) dynasty, which had ruled China for 
nearly three hundred years. The youthful emperor finally 




Empress-Dowager of China 

A portrait by a Chinese artist. The empress 
is represented as a goddess of mercy. She 
stands upon a lotus petal floating on the waves 
of the sea. 



560 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

abdicated, and the oldest empire in the world became a 
republic. 

This sudden awakening of China from her sleep of centuries 
is a prodigious event in world history. Already China possesses 
many thousands of miles of railroads and telegraph 
the^ccident l mes > besides numerous factories, mills, and mines 
equipped with machinery. She has begun the cre- 
ation of a modern army. She has abolished long-established 
customs, such as the torture of criminals and the foot-binding 
of women. She has prohibited the consumption of opium, a vice 
which sapped the vitality of her people. Her temples have 
been turned into schools teaching the sciences and foreign 
languages, and her students have been sent in large numbers to 
foreign universities. Such reforms promise to bring China 
into the fellowship of Occidental nations. 

147. Japan 

Nippon ("Rising Sun") is the name which the inhabitants 
give to the six large islands and about four thousand smaller 
The Japanese ones stretching crescent-like off the coast of eastern 
Archipelago Asia. Because of its generally mountainous char- 
acter, little more than one-eighth of the archipelago can be 
cultivated. Rice and tea form the principal crops, but fruit 
trees of every kind known to temperate climates flourish, and 
flowers bloom luxuriantly. The deep inlets of the coast pro- 
vide convenient harbors, and the numerous rivers, though 
neither large nor long, supply an abundance of water. Below 
the surface lie considerable deposits of coal and metals. 

The Japanese are descended mainly from Koreans and 
Chinese, who displaced the original inhabitants of the archi- 
The Japanese pelago. The immigrants appear to have reached 
people Japan in the early centuries of the Christian era. 

Except for their shorter stature, the Japanese closely resemble 
the Chinese in physique and personal appearance. They are, 
however, more quick-witted and receptive to new ideas than 
their neighbors on the mainland. Other qualities possessed by 
the Japanese in a marked degree include obedience, the result 



the wo: 





I French 
Danish 



J Japanes 



XWERS 




J Belgian 
J Chinese 



Portuguese 



Spanish 



Hs^ef I 1 Russian 



Japan 561 

of n "V centuries of autocratic government ; a martial spirit ; 
and ai. intense patriotism. "Thou shalt honor the gods and 
love thy country" is the first commandment of the national 
faith. 

The Japanese naturally patterned their civilization upon 
that of China. They adopted a simplified form of Chinese 
writing and took over the literature, learning, Japanese 
and art of the "Celestial Empire." The moral conization 
system of Confucius found ready acceptance in Japan, where 
it strengthened the reverence for parents and the worship of 
ancestors. Buddhism, introduced from China by way of 
Korea, brought new ideas of the nature of the soul, of heaven 
and hell, and of salvation by prayer. It is still the prevailing 
religion in Japan. Like the Chinese, also, the Japanese had an 
emperor (the mikado). He became in time only a puppet 
emperor, and another official (the shogun) usurped the chief 
functions of government. Neither ruler exerted much author- 
ity over the nobles (daimios), who oppressed their serfs and 
waged private warfare against one another very much as did 
their contemporaries, the feudal lords of medieval Europe. 

The first European visitors to Japan were Portuguese mer- 
chants and Jesuit missionaries, who came in the sixteenth 
century. The Japanese government welcomed European 
them at first, but the growing unpopularity of intercourse 
the foreigners before long resulted in their expul- W1 
sion from the country. Japan continued to lead a hermit life 
until the middle of the nineteenth century. Foreign inter- 
course began in 1853-1854, with the arrival of an American 
fleet under Commodore M. C. Perry. He induced the shogun to 
sign a treaty which opened two Japanese ports to American 
ships. The diplomatic ice being thus broken, various European 
nations soon negotiated commercial treaties with Japan. 

Thoughtful Japanese, however great their dislike of foreign- 
ers, could not fail to recognize the superiority of the western 
nations in the arts of war and peace. A group The Japanese 
of reformers, including many prominent daimios, Revolutlon 
now carried through an almost bloodless revolution. As the 



562 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

first step, they compelled the shogun to resign his office, thus 
making the mikado 1 the actual as well as titular sovereign 
(1867). Most of the daimios then voluntarily surrendered 
their feudal privileges (187 1). This patriotic act made possible 
the abolition of serfdom and the formation of a national army 
on the basis of compulsory military service. Japan subsequently 
secured a written constitution, with a parliament of two houses 
and a cabinet responsible to the mikado. He is guided in all 
important matters by a group of influential nobles, called the 
"Elder Statesmen," who form the real power behind the throne. 

The revolutionary movement affected almost every aspect of 
Japanese society. Codes of civil, commercial, and criminal 
European- ^ aw were drawn up to accord with those of west- 
ization of em Europe. Universities and public schools were 
established upon Occidental models. Railroads 
and steamship lines were multiplied. The abundant water 
power, good harbors, and cheap labor of Japan facilitated the 
introduction of European methods of manufacturing ; factories 
sprang up on every side ; and machine-made goods began to 
displace the artistic productions of handworkers. Japan thus 
became a modern industrial nation and a competitor of Europe 
for Asiatic trade. 

Once in possession of European arts, sciences, and industries, 
Japan entered upon a career of territorial expansion in eastern 
Expansion Asia. Her merchants and capitalists wanted 
of Japan opportunities for money-making abroad ; above 

all, her rapidly increasing population required new regions 
suitable for colonization beyond the narrow limits of the archi- 
pelago. As we have learned, the Chino- Japanese War (1894- 
1895) brought Korea 2 under Japanese influence and added 
Formosa to the empire. Just ten years later Japan and Russia 
clashed over the disposition of Manchuria. The Russo-Japanese 
War (1904- 1 905) seemed a conflict between a giant and a pygmy, 
but the inequality of the Japanese in numbers and resources was 

1 The youthful Mutsuhito, who reigned 1867-1012. 

2 Known as Chosen since its formal annexation by Japan. Though new Japanese 
subjects, the Koreans continue to agitate for the restoration of their ancient kingdom- 



The Opening-up and Partition of Oceania 563 

more than made up by their preparedness for the conflict, by 
their irresistible bravery, and by the strategic genius which 
their generals displayed. After much bloody fighting by land 
and sea, both sides accepted the suggestion of President Roose- 
velt to arrange terms of peace. The treaty, as signed at Ports- 
mouth, New Hampshire, recognized the claims of Japan in 
Korea, gave to Japan a lease of Port Arthur, and provided for 
the evacuation of Manchuria by both contestants. Russia 
also ceded to Japan the southern half of the island of Sakhalin. 
No indemnity was paid by either country. 

Even before the Russo-Japanese War Great Britain had 
recognized the new importance of Japan by concluding an 
offensive and defensive alliance with the "Island japan as a 
Empire." Each contracting party pledged itself world P° wer 
to come to the other's assistance, in case the possessions of 
either in eastern Asia and India were attacked by another state. 
After the Russo-Japanese War both France and Russia also 
entered into a friendly understanding with Japan for the preser- 
vation of peace in the Far East. 

148. The Opening-up and Partition of Oceania 

The term Oceania, or Oceanica, in its widest sense applies 
to all the Pacific Islands. The continental group includes, in 
addition to the Japanese Archipelago and Formosa, 

\J C C & HI 9 

the Philippines, the Malay Archipelago, Australia, 
and Tasmania. Many of these islands appear to have been 
connected at a remote period, and still more remotely to have 
been joined to the Asiatic mainland. The oceanic group in- 
cludes, besides New Zealand, a vast number of islands and 
islets either volcanic or coralline in formation. They fall into 
the three divisions named Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. 
The natives of Oceania exhibit a wide variety of culture, 
ranging from the savage aborigines of Australia to the semi- 
civilized Filipinos, Malays, and Polynesians. The Oceanic 
first emigrants to the continental islands doubt- P e °P Ies 
less came from Asia and walked dryshod from one archipelago 
to another. On the other hand, the oceanic islands could only 



564 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

have been reached by water. Their inhabitants, at the time 
of European discovery, were remarkable navigators, who sailed 
up and down the Pacific and even ventured into the icy Antarc- 
tic. No evidence exists, however, that they even once sighted 
the coast of America. 

Magellan discovered the Philippines on his voyage of cir- 
cumnavigation in 1 52 1, and for more than three hundred and 
Spain in the fifty years they belonged to Spain. The conquest 
Philippines £ ^ e islands was essentially a peaceful mission- 
ary enterprise. Spanish friars accomplished a remarkable work 
in carrying Christianity to the natives. These converted Fili- 
pinos are the only large mass of Asiatics who have adopted the 
Christian religion in modern times. 

The United States, which took over the Philippines from 

Spain in 1898, adopted a liberal and enlightened policy toward 

Th D'td ^ e mna bitants. A constabulary or police force, 

States in made up of native soldiers and officered by white 

the Philip- men, was organized to maintain order. The agri- 
pines JO o 

cultural lands belonging to the friars were pur- 
chased for the benefit of the people. Hundreds of American 
school teachers were introduced to train Filipino teachers in 
English and modern methods of instruction. Large appropri- 
ations were made for roads, harbors, and other improvements. 
True to democratic traditions, the United States also set up a 
Filipino legislature, which at the present time is entirely elected 
by the natives. But home rule does not satisfy them; they 
want complete independence. The separation movement has 
gained ground rapidly since the World War, which stirred the 
nationalist longings of the Filipinos as of the Koreans, Hindus, 
and Egyptians. American public opinion seems to favor 
withdrawal from the islands, as soon as the inhabitants have 
clearly shown themselves capable of maintaining a stable gov- 
ernment. 

The possessions which Portugal acquired in the Malay Archi- 
pelago were seized by Holland in the seventeenth century. 
All the islands, except British Borneo, the Portuguese part of 
Timor, and the eastern half of New Guinea, belong to the Dutch. 




THE PACIFIC OCEAN 

~2 BRITISH \^_ ~\ PORTUGUESE 

|j FRENCH ~2 JAPANESE 

'J DUTCH | | AMERICAN 



Australia and New Zealand 565 

They were transferred at the end of the eighteenth century from 

the Dutch East India Company to the royal government. The 

Dutch have met the usual difficulties of Europeans „ „ .. 

r Holland 

ruling subject peoples, but their authority seems in the 

to be now thoroughly established throughout the ]^ a !* y 

archipelago. The government is fairly enlightened, 

and considerable progress has been made in educating the 

natives and in raising their economic condition. Although 

Holland freely opens her possessions to traders of other nations, 

Dutch merchants continue to control the lucrative commerce 

of the islands. 

Geographical knowledge of the Pacific islands dates from 

Captain Cook's discoveries in the eighteenth century, but their 

partition among European powers has been com- 

pleted only in the twentieth century. Most of Micronesia, 

them have been annexed by Great Britain and * n ? 

Polynesia 
France. The United States controls Guam, part 

of Samoa, and the Hawaiian Islands. The German possessions 

in the Pacific were surrendered to the Allies shortly after the 

opening of the World War. 

149. Australia and New Zealand 

Australia deserves its rank as a separate continent. In area 
it equals three-fourths of Europe and one-third of North 
America. The characteristic features of Australian Australian 
geography are the slightly indented coast, the lack geography 
of navigable rivers communicating with the interior, the central 
desert, the absence of active volcanoes or snow-capped moun- 
tains, the generally level surface, and the low altitude. Australia 
is the most isolated of all inhabited continents, while the two 
large islands of New Zealand, twelve hundred miles to the 
southeast, are still more remote from the center of the world's 
activities. 

Much of Australia lies in the temperate zone and therefore 
offers a favorable field for white settlement. Captain Cook, 
on the first of his celebrated voyages, raised the British flag 
over the island continent. Colonization began with the founding 



566 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

of Sydney on the coast of New South Wales. For many 
years Australia served as a penal station, to which the British 
Settlement transported the convicts who had been previ- 
of Australia ous ly sent to America. More substantial colonists 
followed, especially after the introduction of sheep-farming 
and the discovery of gold in the nineteenth century. They 
settled chiefly on the eastern and southern coasts, where the 
climate is cool and there is plenty of water and rich pasture 
land. 

New South Wales, the original colony, had two daughter 
colonies, Victoria and Queensland. Two other colonies — 

South Australia and Western Australia — were 
The Austra- founded directly by emigrants from Great Britain, 
monwealth All these states, together with Tasmania, have 
1900 now united into the Australian Commonwealth. 

This federation follows American models in its 
written constitution, its senate and house of representatives, 
and its high (or supreme) court. A governor-general, sent 
from England, represents the British Crown. The Common- 
wealth, however, is entirely self-governing, except in foreign 
affairs. 

Great Britain annexed New Zealand in 1839. Its temperate 
climate, abundant rainfall, and luxuriant vegetation soon at- 
The tracted settlers, who now number more than a 

Dominion of million. In 1907 New Zealand was raised from 
ew ea the rank of a colony to that of a dominion, thus 
taking a place beside South Africa, Australia, and Canada 
among the self-governing divisions of the British Empire. 

150. Canada 

The population of Canada in 1763 was almost entirely French. 
After the American Revolution Canada received a large influx 
Upper and °* "Tories" from the Thirteen Colonies, 1 together 
Lower w ith numerous emigrants from Great Britain. 

The new settlers had so many quarrels with the 
French Canadians that Parliament passed an act dividing 

1 See page 338. 



Canada 567 

the country into Upper Canada for the British and Lower 
Canada for the French. Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and 
Newfoundland remained separate provinces. 

When Great Britain, in retaliation for Napoleon's Continental 
System, issued the Orders in Council, 1 the United States, as 
the chief neutral, was also the chief sufferer. The War of 
injury to American trade, coupled with the quar- 1812 ~ 1814 
rel over the impressment of seamen, provoked the second war 
with Great Britain. It seemed to furnish a good opportunity 
for the conquest of Canada, but British and French Canadians 
united in defense of their country and drove out the American 
armies. The treaty of peace left matters as they were before 
the war. A few years later the United States and Great 
Britain agreed to dismantle forts and reduce naval arma- 
ments on the waterways dividing American from Canadian 
territory. This agreement has been loyally observed on both 
sides for more than a century. The unfortified boundary 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific is an eloquent testimony to 
the good relations between Canada and the United States. 

Canada had done her duty to the British Empire during the 
War of 1812-1814, but she waited more than thirty years for 
her reward in the shape of self-government. The Durham 
Great Britain, after losing the Thirteen Colonies, Re P° rt - 1839 
did not favor any measures which might result in Canadian 
independence as well. Finally, Parliament sent over a wise 
statesman, Lord Durham, to investigate the political discon- 
tent in Canada. Lord Durham in his Report urged that the 
only method of keeping distant colonies is to allow them to rule 
themselves. If the Canadians received freedom to manage 
their domestic affairs they would be more, and not less, loyal, 
for they would have fewer causes of complaint against the mother 
country. The Durham Report produced a lasting effect on 
British colonial policy. Not only did Great Britain grant 
parliamentary institutions and self-government to the Canadian 
provinces, but, as we have seen, she also bestowed the same 
privileges upon her Australasian and South African dominions. 
1 See page 309. 



568 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

Another of Lord Durham's recommendations led to the 
union of Upper Canada (Ontario) and Lower Canada (Quebec) . 
The Domin- " I n ^67 Ontario and Quebec formed with Nova 
ion of Scotia and New Brunswick the confederation 

known as the Dominion of Canada. It has a 
governor-general, representing the British sovereign, a senate 
whose members hold office for life, and an elective house of 
commons, to which the cabinet of ministers is responsible. 
Each Canadian province also maintains a parliament for local 
legislation. The distinguishing feature of the Canadian con- 
stitution is that all powers not definitely assigned by it to the 
provinces belong to the Dominion. Consequently, the ques- 
tion of "states' rights" can never be raised in Canada. 

The new Dominion expanded rapidly. It purchased from 
the Hudson Bay Company the extensive territories out of which 
Territorial the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and 
expansion Alberta have been created. British Columbia 
and Prince Edward Island soon came into the confederation. 
All the remainder of British North America, except Newfound- 
land, which still holds aloof, was annexed in 1878 to the Domin- 
ion of Canada. One government now holds sway over the 
whole region from the Great Lakes to the Arctic Circle. 

Equally rapid has been the development of the Dominion 
in wealth and population. The western provinces, formerly 
Economic left to roving Indian tribes and a few white traders, 
development are attracting numerous foreign immigrants. 
Two transcontinental railroads — the Canadian Pacific, com- 
pleted in 1886, and the more recent Canadian Northern — 
make accessible the agricultural resources of the Dominion, 
its forests, and its deposits of coal and minerals. Canada 
now ranks as the largest, richest, and most populous member 
of the British Empire. 

151. Latin America 

The motives which led to Spanish colonization in America 
may be summed up in the three words "gospel, glory, and 
gold." Missionaries sought converts in the New World; 



Latin America 569 

warriors sought conquests ; and adventurers sought wealth. 
Together, they created for Spain an empire greater in extent 
than any ever known before. After the middle of The 
the sixteenth century homeseekers also came to the Spanish 
colonies, but never in such numbers as to crowd 
out the Indian aborigines. Intermixture between the races 
soon became common, resulting in the half-breeds called 
''mestizos." Although the white element remained dominant 
in public affairs, the racial foundation of most of Spanish America 
was and continues to be Indian. The fact is important, for the 
large proportion of imperfectly civilized Indians and half-breeds, 
together with the negroes who were soon introduced as slaves, 
operated to retard the progress of the Spanish colonies. 

Spain governed her American colonies for her own benefit. 
She crippled their trade by requiring the inhabitants to buy 
only Spanish goods and to sell only to Spaniards. The yoke 
She prohibited such colonial manufactures as of s P ain 
might compete with those at home. Furthermore, she 
filled all the offices in Church and State with Spaniards born 
in the mother country, to the exclusion of those born in the 
colonies (the Creoles) . This restrictive system made the colonists 
long for freedom, especially after they heard the stirring story 
of the revolutions which had created the United States and 
republican France. When Napoleon invaded Spain, forced the 
abdication of Ferdinand VII, and gave the crown to his own 
brother Joseph, 1 the colonists set up practically independent 
states throughout Spanish America. 

Ferdinand VII, who returned to his throne after Napoleon's 
overthrow, was a genuine Bourbon, incapable of learning 
anything or of forgetting anything. 2 His refusal Revolt 
to satisfy the demands of the colonists for equal a e ainst s P ain 
rights with the mother country precipitated the revolt against 
Spain. Its greatest hero is Simon de Bolivar, who, in addi- 
tion to freeing his native Venezuela, helped to free the countries 
now known as Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru. One 
by one all the colonies in South America, together with Central 

|J See page 400. 2 See page 414. 



570 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 




America and Mexico, threw off the Spanish yoke. The United 
States followed the movement with sympathetic eyes, and sent 
commissioners to establish commercial relations with the re- 
volting colonies. Great Britain also took an interest in their 
struggle for liberty and helped them with money, ships, and 

munitions of war. In 
1826 the Spanish flag 
was finally lowered on 
the American conti- 
nents. 

The people of Brazil 
also severed the ties 
uniting them to the 
mother country. They 

Revolt set U P an 

against independ- 

Portugal , 

e n t em- 
pire in 1822, with Dom 
Pedro, the oldest son 
of the Portuguese king, 
as its first ruler. He 
abdicated nine years 
later, in favor of his infant son. Brazil prospered under the 
benevolent sway of the second Dom Pedro, who was the last 
monarch to occupy an American throne. A peaceful revolution 
in 1889 overthrew the imperial government and transformed 
Brazil into a republic. 

The revolts from Spain and Portugal produced seven in- 
dependent states in South America. These were subsequently 
The South increased to ten by the secession of Uruguay from 
American Brazil and the break-up of the Great Colombia, 
established by Bolivar, into the three states of 
Venezuela, Ecuador, and Colombia. All the South American 
republics possess constitutions and the forms of democracy. 
Frequent revolutions and civil wars characterized their history 
during most of the nineteenth century. Nothing else could 
have been looked for, considering that the masses of semi- 



Simon Bolivar 
A medallion by David d'Angers, 1832. 



Latin America 



57i 



civilized Indians, half-breeds, and negroes lacked all polit- 
ical experience. They were easily swayed by ambitious 
politicians and generals, who often became dictators with 
well-nigh absolute power. But the South Americans have 
now served their apprenticeship to liberty. They are learning to 
rule themselves, and the several states seem to be entering 
upon a period of settled, orderly government. 




Erected in 1904 to commemorate the peaceful settlement of a boundary dispute between 
Argentina and Chile. The monument stands at an elevation of twelve thousand feet and 
above the tunnel on the Trans-Andean Railroad. The figure of the Christ, twenty-six feet 
high, was cast from bronze cannon. A tablet on the pedestal reads: 

"Sooner shall these mountains crumble into dust than the people of Argentina and Chile 
break the peace which they have sworn to maintain at the feet of Christ the Redeemer." 



The most prosperous, best governed, and by all odds the 
most important of South American states are Argentina, Brazil, 
and Chile. These states, it may be observed, are The 
precisely the ones which have received the greatest " A-B-C " 
amounts of foreign capital and the largest number powers 
of foreign immigrants. The three "A-B-C" powers — to use 
their popular designation — maintain very friendly relations 



572 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

and generally cooperate in furthering the interests of South 
America abroad. 

The Spanish dependencies in Central America declared their 
independence in 1 821, and two years later formed a federation. 
The Central ^ soon disintegrated into the five diminutive re- 
American publics of Guatemala, Salvador, Honduras, 1 Nic- 
aragua, and Costa Rica. Subsequent attempts to 
bring them together were unsuccessful until 192 1, when repre- 
sentatives of Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras signed a con- 
stitution creating the Federation of Central America. The ad- 
hesion of Costa Rica and possibly of Nicaragua is expected in 
the near future. The government of the new union is modeled 
to a large extent on that of the United States. 

Mexico also secured independence in 1821, only to enter 
upon a long period of disorder. Counting regencies, emperors, 
The presidents, triumvirates, dictators, and other 

Mexican rulers, the "republic" had as many administra- 

repu ic tions during the first half century of its existence 

as the colony had viceroys throughout the whole period of 
Spanish rule. Porfirio Diaz governed the country for many 
years, until an uprising in 191 1 compelled him to withdraw to 
Europe. Civil conflict between rival generals and their fol- 
lowers then ensued. It has now died down, leaving Alvaro 
Obregon as the recognized president. The problems before him 
are difficult. Mexico needs not only a stable government, but 
also land reforms which will raise the "peons " — mostly ignorant 
Indians — from their condition of practical serfdom on the 
estates of great proprietors to that of free men. Whether these 
problems will be solved remains to be seen. 

Most of the smaller West India islands are still held by Great 
Britain, France, and Holland. Haiti, once a French possession, 
The West declared its independence at the time of the Revolu- 
Indies ^ Qn anc j succe ssf ully resisted Napoleon's efforts at 

reconquest. The two negro republics of Haiti and Santo 
Domingo now divide the island between them. Cuba, thanks 
to American intervention during the Spanish-American War, 
1 British Honduras is a Crown colony of Great Britain. 



The United States 573 

also forms a republic. The United States took Porto Rico 
from Spain in 1898 and in 191 7 purchased from Denmark 
the three islands of St. Thomas, St. John, and St. Croix. Their 
acquisition reflects the increased importance of the West Indies 
to the American people. 

152. The United States 

The expansion of the United States beyond the limits fixed 
by the Treaty of Paris in 1783 x began with the purchase of the 
Louisiana territory between the Mississippi River 
and the Rocky Mountains. This immense region, Louisiana 
originally claimed by France in virtue of La Salle's fano hase ' 
discoveries, had passed to Spain at the close of the 
Seven Years' War and had been reacquired for France by Na- 
poleon Bonaparte. The French emperor, about to renew his 
conflict with Great Britain, 2 realized that he could not defend 
Louisiana against the mistress of the seas. Rather than make 
a forced present of the country to Great Britain, he sold it to 
the United States for the paltry sum of $15,000,000. 

The possession of Louisiana gave the United States an out- 
let upon the Gulf of Mexico. This was greatly extended by 
the purchase of Florida from Spain in 181 9 and Acquisitions, 
the annexation of Texas in 1845. The settlement 1803 18 67 
of the dispute of Great Britain as to the Oregon country, the 
Mexican Cession, and the Gadsden Purchase brought the United 
States to the Pacific. Every part of this western territory is 
now linked by transcontinental railroads with the Mississippi 
Valley and the Atlantic-facing states. 

Alaska had been a Russian province since Bering's voyages 
in the eighteenth century. 3 Russia, however, never realized 
the value of her distant dependency and in 1867 Purchase of 
sold it to the United States for $7,200,000. Since Alaska - 18 67 
then Americans have taken from Alaska in gold alone many 
times the original cost of the territory. Its resources in coal, 
lumber, agricultural land, and fisheries are also very great, 
though as yet little has been done to exploit them. 

1 See page 339. 2 See page 395. 3 See page 344. 



574 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

In the last decade of the nineteenth century the United 
States began to secure possessions overseas. The Hawaiian 
Acquisitions, Islands, lying about two thousand miles off the 
1867-1917 coast of California, were annexed in 1898. This 
action was taken at the request of the inhabitants. The same 
year saw the acquisition of the Philippines, Guam, and Porto 
Rico, as the result of the war with Spain. The Samoan island 
of Tutuila and the Danish West Indies (renamed the Virgin 
Islands) have also come into American hands. 

The United States, though not unwilling to obtain colonies 
in the New World, denies the right of any European nation to 
The Monroe acquire additional territory here. This policy 
Doctrine Q f "America for Americans" is known as the Mon- 

roe Doctrine. It was first formulated partly to stave off any 
attempt of the Old World monarchies, led by Metternich, to 
aid Spain in the reconquest of her colonies, and partly to pre- 
vent the further extension southward of the Russian province 
of Alaska. The interests of Great Britain in both these direc- 
tions coincided with those of the United States. Relying on 
the support of the British government, President Monroe sent 
his celebrated message to Congress (1823), in which he declared 
that the American continents were henceforth "not to be con- 
sidered as subjects for future colonization by any European 
powers." x 

The solemn protest of the United States, backed by Great 

Britain, removed for a time the danger of European inter- 

„ , ference in America. During the Civil War, how- 

Enforcement ° ' 

of the ever, Napoleon III took advantage of our difficul- 

Monroe ^ es t0 senc j a F rencn army to Mexico. It conquered 

Doctrine J ... 

the country and set up the archduke Maximilian, 
brother of Francis Joseph I, as emperor. The United States 
protested vigorously, and after the close of the Civil War re- 
quired Napoleon III, under threat of hostilities, to withdraw 
his troops. The French Empire in Mexico then quickly col- 
lapsed. No further assaults on the Monroe Doctrine have 
occurred. 

1 See page 423. 



The United States 



575 



The enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine makes it necessary 
for the United States not only to defend the Latin-American 
republics against foreign aggression, but also to p a n- 
intervene from time to time in their domestic Ameri canism 
affairs. Our warships and soldiers have been repeatedly sent 



=n 



ATLANTIC 
OCEAN 




PACIFIC 
OCEAN 



Relief Map of the Panama Canal 



to the West Indies, Mexico, and Central America for the purpose 
of protecting American and European citizens and their prop- 
erty from rioters or revolutionists. Though grateful to her 



576 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

mighty neighbor for help, Latin America has trembled lest our 
intervention to restore order might pass into downright con- 
quest. The benevolent purposes of this country are now being 
better understood. It has inaugurated a series of Pan-American 
conferences, composed of delegates from all the independent 
nations of the New World. With the assistance of the Latin- 
American republics, it has also established the Pan-American 
Union at Washington, which seeks to spread information about 
the resources and trade of the different countries and also 
to cultivate friendly relations between them. The coopera- 
tion of most of the Central American and South American 
nations with the United States, during the World War, cannot 
fail to strengthen the bonds between the republics of the New 
World. 

The idea of an artificial waterway at Panama or some other 
suitable point had been broached almost as soon as the Spanish 
Panama conquest of Central America and had been re- 

Canal peatedly discussed for more than three centuries. 

Nothing was done until 1881, when a French company, headed 
by De Lesseps, 1 began excavations at Panama. Extravagance 
and corruption characterized the management of the company 
from the start ; it went into bankruptcy before the work was 
half done. The United States in 1902 bought its property 
and rights for forty million dollars. Shortly afterwards, the 
secession of Panama from Colombia enabled the United States 
to obtain from the new republic occupation and control of a 
canal zone, ten miles wide, for the purposes of the canal. The 
work was completed in 1914. It is now open to the shipping 
of all nations, on the payment of moderate tolls. The Panama 
Canal is bound to exercise a profound effect upon the relations 
of North America and South America, because it so lessens the 
distance between the Atlantic, the Gulf, and the Pacific coasts 
of the New World. This means lower freight rates and im- 
provement in the passenger and mail service. Increased com- 
merce, travel, and communication will do much in the future 
to bring together and keep together the two Americas. 

1 See page 550. 







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110° Longitude 100° West from 90° Gre 



Close of Geographical Discovery 577 

153. Close of Geographical Discovery 

Half the globe was still unmapped in 1800. Canada, Alaska, 
and the Louisiana territory were so little known that a geography 
published at this time omits any reference to the Unmapped 
Rocky Mountains. South America, though long re g ions - 180 ° 
settled by white men, continued to be largely unexplored. Scant 
information existed about the Pacific islands and Australia. 
Much of Asia remained sealed to Europeans. Accurate knowl- 
edge of Africa did not reach beyond the edges of that continent. 
The larger part of the Arctic realm had not yet been discovered, 
and the Antarctic realm had barely been touched. 

Discoveries and explorations during the nineteenth century 
carried forward the geographical conquest of the world. The 
great African rivers were traced to their sources Filling in 
in the heart of what had once been the " Dark Con- the ma P 
tinent." In Asia, the headwaters of the Indus and the Ganges 
were reached; the Himalayas measured and shown to be the 
loftiest of mountains; Tibet, the mysterious, penetrated; and 
the veil of darkness shrouding China, Korea, Indo-China, 
and other Asiatic countries lifted. Travelers penetrated the 
deserts of inner Australia and finally crossed the entire continent 
from south to north. The journeys of Alexander von Humboldt 
in the Amazon and Orinoco valleys (1799-1804) inaugurated 
the systematic exploration of South America, while those of 
Lewis and Clark (1 804-1 806) opened up the Louisiana territory. 
Still later, Alaska, the northern territories of Canada, and 
Labrador began to emerge from their obscurity. Even Green- 
land was crossed by Nansen, a Norwegian, and its coast was 
charted by Danish geographers and the American Peary. 

Voyages in search of the Northwest Passage l had already 
revealed the labyrinth of islands, peninsulas, and ice-bound 
channels north of the American continent. Many Arctic 
heroic but fruitless attempts had also been made exploration 
to reach the North Pole. Nansen in 1892-1895 utilized the 

1 The Northwest Passage was first completely navigated by the Norwegian 
Amundsen between 1903 and 1906. 



578 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 



ice drift to carry his ship, the Fram, across the polar sea. Find- 
ing that the drift would not take him to the pole, he left the 
Fram and with a single companion advanced to 86° 14' N., or 
within two hundred and seventy-two miles of the pole. An 
Italian expedition, a few years later, got still farther north. 
The honor of actually reaching the pole was carried off by 
Peary in 1909. He traveled the last stages of the journey by 
sledge over the ice and reached his goal in company with a 

colored servant and several 
Eskimos. Nansen's and Peary's 
journeys showed that no land 
exists in the north polar basin, 
only a sea of great but unknown 
depth. 

The south polar region, on 
the other hand, is a land mass of 

Antarctic continental dimen- 

exploration gions First ap _ 

proached by Cook on his second 
voyage, it has since been visited 
by many explorers. They have 
traced the course of the great 
ice barrier, discovered exten- 
sive mountain ranges, and even 
found two volcanoes belching forth lava amidst the snows. 
In 1 907-1 909 a British expedition under Sir Ernest Shackleton 
attained 88° 23' S., or within ninety-seven miles of the pole. 
Amundsen, who reached the pole in 191 1, was soon followed by 
Captain R. F. Scott, but this gallant Englishman and his four 
companions died of cold and starvation on the return journey. 
The records of polar exploration are, indeed, full of tragedies. 
Considerable spaces of the earth's surface still await scientific 
investigation. The Antarctic continent and Greenland offer 
Regions still many problems to geographers. The enormous 
unmapped basin of the Amazon is still little known. Practi- 
cally no knowledge exists of the interior of New Guinea, the 
largest of islands, if Australia be reckoned as a continent. 




Robert E. Peary 




579 



580 Colonial Expansion and World Politics 

Australia itself has not been completely explored. In Asia, 
there is still much information to be gained concerning the 
great central plateau, the Arctic coast, and inner Arabia. 
Equatorial Africa affords another promising field for discov- 
ery. It thus remains for the twentieth century to complete 
the geographical conquest of the world. 

Studies 

1. "Europe to-day is no more than a portion of the European world." Com- 
ment on this statement. 2. What parts of the Old World are occupied or colonized 
by Anglo-Saxon peoples? By Latin peoples? By Slavic peoples? 3. What is 
the origin of the names Liberia, Rhodesia, Philippines, Tasmania, and New Zealand ? 
4. Distinguish between the Near East and the Far East, as these expressions are 
commonly used. 5. Trace the routes followed by the Cape-to-Cairo and Trans- 
Siberian railways. 6. Show how Africa has become an "annex of Europe." 7. Why 
has the Suez Canal been called the "spinal cord" of the British Empire? 8. What 
possessions in India are still kept by Portugal and France? 9. Look up in an en- 
cyclopedia an account of the life and teachings of the Buddha. 10. Do the Chinese 
form a genuine nation? How is it with the Japanese? n. On the map be- 
tween pages 554-555 trace the Great Wall of China. 12. Show that the Chino- 
Japanese and Russo-Japanese wars contributed to the awakening of China. 13. 
Compare the Europeanization of Japan in the nineteenth century with that of Russia 
in the eighteenth century. 14. Why has Japan been called "the Great Britain of the 
Far East " ? 15. Why are the Hawaiian Islands called the ' ' crossroads of the Pacific ' ' ? 
16. What parts of the New World are to-day occupied or colonized by Anglo- 
Saxon peoples? By Latin peoples? 17. What is the origin of the names Alberta, 
Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Louisiana? 18. Why has Lord Durham's 
Report been styled the "Magna Carta of the British colonies"? 19. What Euro- 
pean powers retain possessions in South America, Central America, and the West 
Indies? 20. How was the promulgation of the Monroe Doctrine a check to Metter- 
nichismus? 21. On the map, page 579, follow Nansen's, Peary's, and Amundsen's 
routes in the polar regions. 



CHAPTER XVII 
THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 1 

154. Modern Industrialism 

The year 1776, the year of the Declaration of Independence 
and of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, also marks, approxi- 
mately, the commencement of the Industrial p er i 0( i f 
Revolution. No other word except "revolution" the Industrial 
so well describes those wholesale changes in 
manufacturing, transportation, and other industries, which, 
within a century and a half, have transformed modern life. 
This revolution originated in Great Britain, spread after 181 5 
to the Continent and the United States, and now extends 
throughout the civilized world. 

The rapid expansion of European peoples over Africa, Asia, 
Oceania, and America, as described in the preceding chap- 
ter, was itself largely an outcome of the Indus- Colonial 
trial Revolution. Improvements in means of ex P an s ion 
transportation — railroads, canals, steam navi- industrial 
gation — by facilitating travel permitted an ex- Revolution 
tensive emigration from Europe into other continents. Im- 
proved communication — the telegraph and the telephone — 
by annihilating distance made easier the occupation and govern- 
ment of remote dependencies. The growth of manufacturing 
in Europe also gave increased importance to colonies as sources 
of supply for raw materials and foodstuffs, as markets for 
finished goods, and as places of investment for the surplus 
wealth accumulated by the capitalists whom the Industrial 
Revolution created. 

The Industiial Revolution also created a numerous body of 

'Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 24, "Communist Manifesto, 1848"; 
No. 25, "Declaration of Paris, 1856." 

58i 



582 The Industrial Revolution 

wage-earners, who moved from rural districts and villages 
into the factories, sweatshops, and tenements of the great 

cities. There, in spite of a crowded, miserable 
and the existence, they gradually learned the value of 

industrial organization. They formed trade unions in order 

to secure higher wages and shorter hours. They 
read newspapers and pamphlets, listened to speeches by agi- 
tators, and began to press for laws which would improve 
their lot. Then they went further and demanded the right to 
vote, to hold office, to enjoy all the liberty and equality which 
the bourgeoisie, or middle class, had won from monarchs and 
aristocrats. The Industrial Revolution furnished much of the 
driving power for the democratic movement which has been 
so marked in Europe during the nineteenth century. It thus 
reinforced the new ideas of democracy introduced into the world 
by the American and French revolutions. 

The Industrial Revolution likewise fostered the national 
movement in Europe during the last century. Railroads, 
__ canals, steamboats, telegraphs, and telephones 

and the have been compared to a network of veins and 

Industrial arteries carrying the blood of the nation from the 

capital to the remotest province. Such increased 
facilities for travel and communication inevitably caused the 
disappearance of local prejudices and provincial limitations. 
It was now far easier for the people of each country to realize 
their common interests than when they lived isolated in small 
rural communities. Old nations, like Great Britain and France, 
became more closely knit ; new nations, like Italy and Germany, 
arose; and the "submerged nationalities" of Europe started 
an agitation for self-government or for complete independence. 
Great Britain took the lead in the Industrial Revolution. 
Her damp climate proved to be very favorable to the manu- 
Th 1 d facture of textiles, her swift streams supplied 

trial Revolu- abundant water power for machinery, and beneath 

Britain Gfeat ^ er s0 ^ * a y stores °f coa ^ an d i ron ore - There 

were other favoring circumstances. Industry in 

Great Britain was less fettered by guild restrictions than on the 




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0° LongiLudi; Bast from Greenwich 



The Great Inventions 583 

Continent. She possessed more surplus capital for investment, 
more skilled laborers, and a larger merchant marine than any 
other country. Furthermore, Great Britain had emerged from 
the Seven Years' War victorious over all her rivals for maritime 
and commercial supremacy. Her trade in the markets of the 
world grew by leaps and bounds after 1763. The enormous 
demand for British goods in its turn stimulated the mechanical 
genius of British artisans and so produced the era of the great 
inventions. 

155. The Great Inventions 

Man has advanced from savagery to civilization chiefly 
through invention. Beginning in prehistoric times, he slowly 
discovered how to supplement hands and feet 
and teeth and nails by the use of tools. From 
the tool it was a forward step to the machine, which, when 
supplied with muscular energy, only needed to be directed by 
man to do his work. The highest type of machine is one 
driven by natural forces — by wind, waterfall, steam, gas, 
or electricity. Invention thus gives man an ever-increasing 
control over nature. He becomes nature's conqueror, rather 
than its slave. 

A list of prehistoric tools and machines would include levers, 
rollers, and wedges ; oars, sails, and rudders; fishing nets, 
lines, and hooks; the plow and the wheeled cart; Development 
the needle, bellows, and potter's wheel; the dis- of invention 
taff and spindle for spinning; and the hand loom for weav- 
ing. Few important additions to this list were made in 
antiquity, even by such cultivated peoples as the Egyptians, 
Babylonians, Greeks, and Romans. The Middle Ages were 
also singularly barren of inventions. It was only toward 
the close of the medieval period that the mariner's compass, 
paper, and movable type reached Europe from Asia. More 
progress took place during the sixteenth and seventeenth cen- 
turies, which produced the telescope, microscope, thermometer 
and barometer, clocks and watches run by weights, sawmills 
driven by wind or water, an improved form of the windmill, 



584 



The Industrial Revolution 



and the useful though humble wheelbarrow. Manufacturing 
and transportation continued, however, to be carried on in 
much the same rude way as before the dawn of history. 

The revolution in manufacturing began with the textile in- 
dustry. Old-fashioned spinning formed a slow, laborious pro- 
Old-fashioned cess. The wool, flax, or cotton, having been fas- 
spinning tened to a stick called the distaff, was twisted by 

hand into yarn or thread and wound upon a spindle. 1 The 

spinning wheel — long known in India 
and not unknown in Europe as early 
as the fourteenth century — after- 
wards came into general use. The 
spinner now no longer held the spindle 
in her hand, but set it upon a frame 
and connected it by a belt to the 
wheel, which, when revolved, turned 
the spindle. The subsequent addition 
of a treadle to move the wheel freed 
both hands of the spinner, so that 
she could twist two threads instead 
of one. 

Weaving was done on the hand 
loom, a wooden frame to which verti- 
Old-fashioned cal threads (the warp) 
weaving were attac h e d. Hori- 

zontal threads (the weft or woof) were 
then inserted by means of an enlarged 
needle or shuttle. The invention of 
the " flying shuttle" in the eighteenth 
century enabled the operator, by pull- 
ing a cord, to jerk the shuttle back and forth without the aid 
of an assistant. This simple device not only saved labor but 
also doubled the speed of weaving. 

The demand for thread and yarn quickly outran the supply, 
for the spinners could not keep up with the weavers. Prizes 
were then offered for a better machine than the spinning 

1 See the illustration, page 624. 




A Spinning Wheel 

A band or cord {E) connected 
the large wheel with the small 
wheel (D). Another cord (F) con- 
nected the small wheel with the 
grooved pulley, or wharve, on the 
spindle (C). The revolutions of 
the large wheel turned the small 
wheel very rapidly, thus com- 
municating motion to the spindle 
through the wharve. 



The Great Inventions 



5*5 



wheel. At length, James Hargreaves, a poor workman of Lan- 
cashire in northern England, patented what he named the 
"spinning jenny," in compliment to his industrious Hargreaves's 

wife. This machine carried a number of spindles " s v in ™ n z 

1 i 1 j jenny, 1770 

turned by cords or belts from the same wheel, and 

operated by hand. It was a very crude affair, but it spun at 

first eight threads, then sixteen, and within the inventor's own 

lifetime eighty, thus doing the work of many spinning wheels. 

The thread spun by the "spinning jenny" was so frail that 

it could be used only for the weft. 

The spinners needed a ma- Arkwright's 

chine to produce a hard, " water _ 
, , - frame," 1769 

strong thread for the warp. 

Richard Arkwright met this need by 
the invention of the "water frame," so 
called because it was 
run by water power. 
The machine con- 
tained two sets of 
rollers, one rotating 
at a higher speed than 
the other. The cotton 
was drawn out by the 
rollers to the requisite 
fineness and was then 
twisted into thread by 
revolving spindles. 




Arkwright's Spinning Wheel 

As patented in 1769. Above, draft rollers; below, flyer 
spindles; at the left, wheel which propelled the entire 
mechanism. 



Samuel Crompton soon combined the essential features of 
the Hargreaves and Arkwright machines into what became 
known as the "mule, " because of its hybrid origin, crompton's 
When the mechanism was drawn out on its wheels " mule," 

1779 

one way, the strands of cotton were stretched and 

twisted into threads ; when it was run back the other way, the 

spun threads were wound on spindles. The "mule" quite 

superseded Hargreaves's device. It has been steadily improved, 

and at the present time may carry as many as two thousand 

spindles. 



586 



The Industrial Revolution 




Cartwright's 
power loom, 
1785 



Cartwright's First Power Loom 

The shuttle was propelled mechanically through the long, 
trough-shaped form extending out at the sides. 



These three inven- 
tions again upset the 
balance 
in the 
textile 
industry, for now the 
spinners could pro- 
duce more thread 
and yarn than the 
weavers could con- 
vert into cloth. 
The invention which 
revolutionized weav- 
ing was made by 
Edward Cartwright, 
an English clergy- 
man, who had never 
even seen a weaver 
at work. He con- 
structed a loom with an automatic shuttle operated by water 
power. Improvements in this machine enable a single operator 
to produce more cloth than two hundred men could weave 
on the old-fashioned hand 
loom. 

Both spinners and 
weavers required for the 
The cotton new machinery 
gin, 1794 an abundant 

supply of raw material. 
They found it in cotton, 
which previously had been 
much less used than either 
wool or flax. Eli Whitney 
of Connecticut, while visit- 
ing a cotton plantation in 
Georgia, conceived the idea 
of what he called an engine, 




Whitney's Cotton Gin 

After the original model. The teeth of the saws 
caught the lint, pulling it from the seeds, and a 
revolving cylinder, studded with nails, removed the 
detached lint from the saws. Power was applied 
by the crank. 



The Great Inventions 587 

or gin, for separating the seeds from the raw cotton much more 
rapidly than negro slaves could do it by hand. His cotton gin 
stimulated enormously American production of cotton for the 
mills of Great Britain. 

What was to furnish motive power for the new machinery? 
Windmills were obviously too unreliable to be profitably used. 
Human hands had at first operated Hargreaves's Watt's steam 
"spinning jenny," and horses had worked Ark- engine, 
wright's original machine. Both inventors, how- 
ever, soon turned to water power to drive the wheel, and nu- 
merous mills were built along the streams of northern England, 
Then came steam power. The expansive force of steam, though 
known in antiquity, was first put to practical service at the 
close of the seventeenth century, when steam pumps were in- 
vented for ridding mines of water. James Watt, a Scotchman 
of mechanical genius, patented an improved steam pump in 1769 
and subsequently adapted his engine for the operation of spinning 
machines and looms. In 1785 it began to be used in factories. 

The nineteenth century has been called the age of steam. 
The steamboat, the steam locomotive, and the steam printing 
press are some of the children of Watt's epochal The age 
invention. Toward the close of the century of steam 
electricity began to compete with steam as a motive force, 
after the invention of that mystic marvel of science, the dy- 
namo, and in the twentieth century the gas engine, as applied 
to automobiles, airplanes, tractors, and other machines, con- 
tinued the Industrial Revolution. 

The growing use of machinery called for an increased produc- 
tion of iron. Northern and north-central England contained 
vast deposits of iron ore, but until the latter part The age of 
of the eighteenth century they had been little iron and steel 
worked. Improved methods of smelting with coal and coke, 
by means of the blast furnace, were then adopted. Steel, 
a product of iron, whose toughness and hardness had been 
prized for ages, was not manufactured on a large scale until 
after 1850. Better methods of manufacture now enable the 
poorest iron to be converted into excellent steel, thus opening 



588 The Industrial Revolution 

up extensive fields of low-grade ore in France, Germany, and 
other countries. Used in every form, from building-girders 
to watch springs, steel is now the mainstay of modern industry. 

The manufacture of iron and steel and the operation of the 
new machinery required an abundant, inexpensive fuel. Coal 
The age had long been burned in small quantities for 

of coal domestic purposes ; applied to the steam engine 

and the blast furnace it was to become an almost boundless 
source of power and heat. Various improvements in mining 
cheapened its production, one of the most notable being the 
safety lamp, which protected miners against the deadly fire- 
damp and thus enabled the most dangerous mines to be worked 
with comparative safety. Great Britain furnished nearly all 
the coal for manufacturing until the middle of the nineteenth 
century ; later, much of the world's supply has come from the 
mines of France, Germany, and the United States. 

Mineral oil, or petroleum, has become an industrial rival 
of coal, since the first oil well was sunk in Pennsylvania in 
The age 1 859. There are now more than three hundred 

of oil products of petroleum, the most important being 

kerosene for illumination, gasolene (petrol) for gas engines, 
and fuel for oil-burning ships and locomotives. The United 
States is still the chief producer of oil, but we now consume 
even more than we produce. Many new sources of supply 
will have to be opened up throughout the world, if the present 
consumption of petroleum in the United States, Great Britain, 
and other countries is to continue indefinitely. 

156. Effects of the Great Inventions 

The great inventions, besides hastening the transition from 
hand-labor to machine-labor, also did much to separate labor 
Guild and capital. No such separation was possible 

system m ^q Middle Ages. A master who belonged to a 

craft guild purchased his raw materials at the city market or at 
a fair, manufactured them in his own house, assisted by the 
members of his family and usually by a few journeymen and 
apprentices, and himself sold the finished article to the person 







u bo 



K -5 



Effects of the Great Inventions 589 

who had ordered it. This guild system, as it is called, has not 
entirely disappeared. One may still have a pair of shoes made 
by a "custom" shoemaker or a suit of clothes made by a "cus- 
tom" tailor. 

The growing exclusiveness of the craft guilds, toward the 
close of the medieval period, 1 prevented many apprentices and 
journeymen from ever becoming masters. Conse- Domestic 
quently, workers often left the cities and settled s y stem 
in the country or in villages where there were no guild re- 
strictions. The movement gave rise to the domestic system, 
as found, for example, in the British cotton industry. A middle- 
man with some capital would purchase a supply of raw cotton 
and distribute it to the spinners and weavers to convert into 
cloth on their own spinning wheels and hand looms. They 
worked at home and usually eked out their wages by cultivating 
a small garden plot. Something akin to the domestic system 
still survives in the sweatshops of modern cities, where clothing 
is made on "commission." 

It is clear that under the domestic system the middleman 
provided the raw materials, took all the risks, and received all 
the profits. The workers, on the other hand, had Factory 
to accept such wages and labor upon such con- s y stem 
ditions as he was willing to offer. The separation of labor and 
capital, which thus began under the domestic system, became 
complete under the factory system. Arkwright's, Crompton's, 
and Cartwright's machines were too expensive for a single 
family to own ; too large and heavy for use in private houses ; 
and they needed water power or steam power to operate them. 
The consequence was that the domestic laborer abandoned his 
household industry and went with hundreds of others to work 
in a mill or factory. The capitalist employer now not only 
provided the raw materials and disposed of the finished 
product, but he also owned the machinery and the work- 
shop. The word "manufacturer" 2 no longer applied to the 

1 See pages 228 and 350. 

2 Latin manu, facere, to make by hand. Manufacture by machinery has been 
well-named machinofacture. 



INDUSTRIAL 

ENGLAND 

IN THE 
TWENTIETH CENTURY 

Principal Manufacturing Districts are indic- 
ated by showing Important Industrial Cen- 
ters having a population of 100,000 or 

in 1911 • ^5«5» 

CoaLFields % 

Densest Population in 1911 f_ : j 

Densest Population in 1750 . Nort '""'"'_ 
Scale of Miles 
25 60 76 100 



NORTH 




ENGL I S H 



C H A N N E 



WORKS, BUFFALO, 



Longitude West 2 from Greenwich 

590 



Effects of the Great Inventions 591 

hand-worker, but to the person who employed others to work 
for him. 

The factory system introduced a minute division of labor into 
industry. Thus, there are forty operations involved in the 
manufacture of ready-made clothing; nearly Division 
one 'hundred in the manufacture of shoes ; and of labor 
over a thousand in the construction of a fine watch. Many 
men, working together, may turn out in a few minutes an article 
which one man formerly required weeks or months to produce. 

Machinery, the factory system, and the division of labor 
made it possible to manufacture on a large scale and in enormous 
quantities for world-wide markets. For example, Large-scale 
the value of British cotton goods has increased P roduction 
six hundred per cent during the last century and a half. Simi- 
lar increases have been registered in other textile manufactures 
and in the iron industry of Great Britain. 

The Industrial Revolution soon changed the face of Great 
Britain. Instead of farms, hamlets, and an occasional small 
town, appeared great cities crowded with workers p r j macy f 
who had left their rural homes to seek employ- Great Britain 
ment in factories. The movement of population m in us ry 
was especially toward the northern and northwestern counties, 
where there were many streams to furnish water power, and 
abundant supplies of coal and iron. The Industrial Revolu- 
tion began later on the Continent than in Great Britain, 
partly because of the opposition of the guilds, which feared 
that the new machinery would deprive workers of employ- 
ment; partly because Continental manufacturers showed less 
enterprise than their British rivals; but chiefly because the 
revolutionary and Napoleonic wars left France and Germany 
too exhausted to compete in manufacturing. Great Britain 
thus became by 1815 the world's workshop and the richest 
of European nations. 

The map of the occupations of mankind affords a summary 
view of the progress of the Industrial Revolution throughout 
the world. As far as Europe is concerned, we see that the 
western half of the continent has now been pretty thoroughly 



592 



The Industrial Revolution 



industrialized, except for such areas as western Ireland, north- 
ern Scotland, central Spain, southern Italy, the Alpine region, 
Indus- and the Scandinavian peninsula. The industrial 

tnahzation development of Russia is limited to the west- 
ern and southern sections ; that of the Balkan states is negligible. 
Large and growing manufacturing districts are found in India, 
China, Japan, eastern Australia, and New Zealand. The man- 
ufacturing districts of Africa and South America are too slight 
for representation on a small-scale map. In North America both 
Mexico and Canada have begun to share with the United States 
in the benefits of the Industrial Revolution. 



fashioned 
conveyances 



157. Improvements in Transportation 

Civilized man until the Industrial Revolution continued to 
use the conveyances which had been invented by uncivilized 
01d _ man in prehistoric times. Travel and transport 

were still on horseback, or in litters, wheeled carts, 
rowboats, and sailboats. Various improvements 
produced the sedan chair, the stagecoach, and large ocean- 
going ships, without, 
however, finding any 
substitutes for mus- 
cles or wind as the 
motive power. 

The roads in west- 
ern Europe scarcely 
deserved that name ; 
they were little more 
than track ways, 
either deep with mud 
or dusty and full of ruts. Passengers in stagecoaches seldom 
made more than fifty miles a day, while heavy 
goods had to be moved on pack horses. Condi- 
tions in Great Britain improved during the latter part of the 
eighteenth century, for the enormous quantity of goods produced 
by the new machinery increased the need for cheap and rapid 
transport. The turnpike system, allowing tolls to be charged 




An Eighteenth-century Stagecoach 

After an old print. 



Roads 



Improvements in Transportation 



593 



for the use of roads, encouraged the investment of capital by 
private companies in these undertakings ; and it was not long 
before engineers covered the country with well-bottomed and 
well-surfaced highways. The splendid highways which attract 
the attention of Americans on the Continent were all built 
in the nineteenth century, chiefly before the era of railroads. 
The expense of transportation by road led people in antiquity 
and the Middle Ages to send their goods by river routes when- 
ever possible. Canal-building in # Europe began 
toward the close of the medieval period, especially 
after the invention of locks for controlling the flow and level 
of the water. The great era of the canal was between 1775 
and 1850, not only in Great Britain and on the Continent, 
but also in the United States. Canals relieved the highways 
of a large part of the growing traffic, but the usefulness of both 
declined after the introduction of railroads. Ship canals, how- 
ever, have begun to be constructed within recent years, as a re- 
sult of the general adoption of steam navigation on the ocean. 




The "Clermont," 1807 
A reconstruction prepared by the Hudson-Fulton Celebration Committee, 1907. 



steamboat 



The earliest successful steamboat appears to have been a 
tug built in Scotland for towing canal boats. Robert Fulton, 
an American engineer who had lived in England The 
and France, adapted the steamboat to river navi- 
gation. His side-wheeler, the Clermont, equipped with a 
Watt engine, began in 1807 to make regular trips on the Hudson 
between New York and Albany. Twelve years later an Ameri- 
can vessel, provided with both sails and a steam engine, crossed 



594- 



The Industrial Revolution 



the Atlantic in twenty-nine days. The first ship to cross 
without using sails or recoaling on the way was the Great West- 
em, in 1838. The trip took her fifteen days. 

Various improvements since the middle of the nineteenth 
century added greatly to the efficiency of ocean steamers. 
Steam Iron, and later steel, replaced wood in their con- 

navigation struction, with a resulting gain in strength and 
buoyancy. Screw propellers were substituted for clumsy 
paddle wheels, and turbine engines, which apply the energy 



W r X 




The "Rocket," 1830 

Built by Stephenson to compete in a trial of locomotive engines for the Liverpool and 
Manchester Railway. The greatest speed it attained in the trial was 29 miles an hour, but 
some years later it ran at the rate of 53 miles an hour. The total weight of the engine and 
tender was only about 7! tons. 

of a jet of steam to secure the rotation of a shaft, were intro- 
duced. The size of steamers, also, has so increased that the 
Great Western, a boat of 1378 tons and 212 feet in length, would 
appear a pygmy by the side of the fifty- thousand ton "levia- 
thans" which now cross the Atlantic in less than five days. 

Wooden or iron rails had long been used in mines and quar- 
ries to enable horses to draw heavy loads with ease. George 
The steam Stephenson, who profited by the experiments of 
locomotive other inventors, produced in 1814 a successful lo- 
comotive for hauling coal from the mine to tide-water. He 
improved his model and eleven years later secured its adoption 



Improvements in Transportation 



595 



on the Stockton and Darlington Railway, the first line over 
which passengers and freight were carried by steam power. 
Stephenson also built the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, 
on which his famous engine, the Rocket, made its maiden trip. 

Many technical improvements — the increased size of loco- 
motives and cars, air brakes, and the use of steel rails in place 
of iron rails which supported only light loads and R a ii roa( i 
wore out rapidly — have extended the usefulness transporta- 
of the railroad far beyond the dreams of its earlier 
promoters. The greatest development of railroad transporta- 
tion came in the latter part of the nineteenth century, with 




A Precursor of the Automobile 

An old picture of F. Hill's steam carriage running between London and Birmingham, 
1839-1843. 

the construction of great "trunk" lines and branches ("feed- 
ers") radiating into the remotest districts. Western Europe 
and the United States are now covered with a network of rail- 
roads, and these are being extended rapidly to all civilized 
and even semi-civilized lands. 

Modern electric traction dates from the early 'eighties of the 
last century, when the overhead trolley began to supplant 
horse cars and cable cars in cities. The develop- Electric 
ment of the electric locomotive promises to bring tractl0n 
about a partial substitution of electricity for steam on rail- 
roads through tunnels and over heavy grades. 



596 The Industrial Revolution 

The earliest application of steam power to transportation 
was neither the railway nor the steamboat but the road engine. 
The As far back as 1801 an English inventor con- 

automobiie structed a steam carriage for passengers. Re- 
peated efforts were made during the next forty years to 
popularize the new mode of travel in England, but bad roads 
and an unsympathetic public discouraged inventors. The 
automobile had to wait for the gas or "internal com- 
bustion" engine (as patented in the last decade of the 
nineteenth century) to become a commercial success. 

The history of the airplane illustrates the truth that great 
inventions do not spring fully developed from the brain of one 

„ . , man, but, on the contrary, represent the long and 

The airplane ' ' V 

patient experimentation of many men. An Ameri- 
can scientist, S. P. Langley, who himself owed much to the 
work of others, produced in 1903 a heavier-than-air machine 
which was driven by steam. The accidents attending its first 
trials caused it to be abandoned. The Wright Brothers, using 
an airplane fitted with a gas engine, soon followed where Lang- 
ley had led the way. As every one knows, the exigencies 
of the World War resulted in an extraordinarily rapid develop- 
ment of the airplane. Its powers were most strikingly revealed 
by two British aviators, Alcock and Brown, who in June, 1919, 
made a non-stop flight across the Atlantic from Newfoundland 
to Ireland, covering the distance in less than sixteen hours. 

Experiments in balloon navigation continued through- 
out the nineteenth century, and finally Count Zeppelin, an 

. . . officer in the German army, produced an airship 
The airship . in 1 

which consisted, not of one balloon, but of a row of 

bags inclosed in an enormous shell of aluminium trellis work. 
It carried two cars, each provided with a gas motor. The 
trial of this Zeppelin in 1900 showed how nearly the problem 
of a dirigible balloon had been solved. Other successful air- 
ships were soon constructed in France and England. The 
World War stimulated their development, as was the case with 
the airplane. To the British dirigible, the R-34, belongs the 
renown of having been the first to cross the Atlantic (July 2-6, 



Improved Communications 



597 



1919). The R-34 carried a crew and passengers from Scotland 
to Long Island, covering the distance of 3200 miles in a trifle 
more than 108 hours. The return trip took only three days. 

As far back as the Revolutionary War, an American inventor 
constructed a tiny submarine and tried, without success,' to 
sink a British warship. Robert Fulton, encour- The 
aged by Napoleon, made several submarines. In submarm e 
one of them he descended to a depth of twenty-five feet, re- 
mained below for four hours, and succeeded in blowing up a 
small vessel with a torpedo. Under-water boats, propelled 
by steam power, were used by the Confederates in the Civil 
War. From about this time inventors in several countries 
worked on the problem of the submarine. One of the most 
successful was an Irish-American, J. P. Holland, who sold the 
boat named after him to the United States in 1898. The 
improvement of the submarine from this time is a familiar 
story. Thus, in the course of about a century, man has com- 
pleted the conquest of land and air and sea. 

158. Improved Communications 

Scientists of the eighteenth century often discussed 
the idea of using electricity to communicate at a dis- 
tance, but a practi- 
cable apparatus for 
convert- The 
ing the telegraph 

electric current into 
intelligible signs did 
not appear until the 
'thirties of the nine- 
teenth century. 
Samuel F.B. Morse, 
an American, de- 
serves perhaps the 
greatest credit for 

the invention. He 

. Morse s First Telegraph Instrument, 1837 

also devised the In the U. S. National Museum, Washington. 




598 



The Industrial Revolution 




"Morse alphabet." The telegraph found an immediate appli- 
cation on the railroads and in the transmission of government 
messages. Later, it made its way into the business world. 

Hardly any one at first believed that a telegraph line could 
be carried across the ocean. Experiments soon showed, how- 
Submarine ever, that wire cords, protected by wrappers of 
cables gutta percha, would conduct the electric current 

under water. The first cable was laid from Dover to Calais. 
A group of American promoters, including Cyrus W. Field, 
then took up the project of an Atlantic cable which should 
"moor the New World alongside the Old." Discouraging fail- 
ures marked the enterprise. 
The first cables were broken 
by the ocean, and the line 
which was finally laid soon 
became useless, owing to the 
failure of its electrical insu- 
lation. After the Civil War 
Field renewed his efforts, 
and in 1866 a cable two 

forming a conductor; a wrapping of thread (3) thousand miles long was SUC- 
soaked in pitch; several layers of gutta percha (2); cessfully laid and COmmuni- 
and the covering of twisted wires ( 1 ). . . , __ . 

cation perfected. JNo less 
than fourteen lines now stretch across the Atlantic, while all 
the other oceans have been electrically bridged. 

Experimentation with rude forms of the telephone began 
in the same decade which produced the telegraph. Little 
The tele- progress took place until 1875, when Alexander 
phone Graham Bell, a native of Edinburgh but later a 

resident of Boston, patented his first instrument. Many 
improvements have since been made in it by Bell himself, 
Thomas A. Edison, and others. 

The invention of wireless telegraphy by the 
Italian, Guglielmo Marconi, may be said to date 
from 1899, when wireless messages were sent be- 
tween France and England across the Channel. 
A trans- Atlantic service by "wireless" began eight years later, 



The Original Atlantic Cable 

The illustration shows seven copper wires (4) 



Wireless 
telegraphy 
and 
telephony 



Improved Communications 



599 




and since then improvements of Marconi's apparatus have 
enabled wireless messages to be sent half-way around the 
world. The still more recent introduction of wireless teleph- 
ony promises to work another revolution in long-distance 
communication. Already speech without wires 
is possible between Paris and New York. 

A regular postal service under government 
management existed in Europe as early as the 
seventeenth century, but it was The postal 
slow, expensive, and little used. service 
Stamps were unknown, prepayment of postage p IEST Adhesive 
was considered an insult, and rates increased Penny Post- 
according to distance. The modern postal AGE Stamp 
service began in Great Britain in 1840, with The design, a con- 

.... . - . . . ventionalized head of 

the adoption of a uniform charge irrespective Queen victoria, was 
of distance (penny postage), prepayment, and used without change 
the use of stamps. These reforms soon spread 
to other countries and everywhere resulted in greatly in- 
creased use of the mails. The International Postal Union, 
with a central office at Berne, Switzerland, makes arrange- 
ments for common rates of foreign postage and for coopera- 
tion in carrying the mails from country to country. 



THE 




SUN. 



Number 1 1 



NEW YORK. TL'ESDAV, SEPTEMBER 3, 1833 



PUBLISHES DAILV, 




The First Copy of the New York "Sun" 

The New York Sun, established in 1833, was the first penny newspaper in the United States. 

Weekly and daily newspapers also began to appear in the 
seventeenth century, but they were luxuries reserved for sub- 
scribers of the middle and upper classes. The _ T 

^^ Newspapers 

cheap newspaper for the masses is a product of 

the Industrial Revolution. The London Times installed the 



600 The Industrial Revolution 

first steam printing press in 1814. A paper-making machine, 
which produced wide sheets of unlimited length, came into 
use soon after. To these inventions must be added the lino- 
type machine. In newspaper offices, where rapid composition is 
necessary, it has largely superseded hand-work in setting type. 
Many inventions in communication — the instantaneous 
camera, the cinematograph or motion picture, the phonograph, 
The new the automatic piano — are so new that we have 

communica- scarcely as yet begun to realize their possibilities. 
Properly directed, they will furnish the common 
people in civilized countries with an education in art, music, and 
the drama which in former days could be secured only by per- 
sons of wealth and leisure. Their great service promises to be 
that of democratizing culture, as cheap newspapers and books 
have democratized knowledge. 

159. Commerce 

A tremendous expansion of commerce followed the improve- 
ments in transportation and communication. Macadamized 
Commercial roads, inland and ship canals, ocean steamships, 
expansion an( j railroads reduced freight rates to a mere 
fraction of those once charged, while the telegraph, telephone, 
cheap postage, and newspapers made possible the rapid spread 
of information relating to crops and markets. It is estimated 
that the commerce of the world (including even backward 
countries) increased over twelve hundred per cent in the nine- 
teenth century. Rapid as was the growth of the world's 
population during this period, commerce grew much faster; 
so that the average share of each human being in international 
trade amounted in 1900 to a sum six times that in 1800. During 
the first two decades of the twentieth century commercial 
expansion has been on a still more colossal scale. 

The organization of commerce shows wonderful changes 

since the Middle Ages. There is now so steady a flow of com- 

,, i modifies from producers through wholesalers and 

Exchanges ^ ° 

retailers to consumers that the old system of 

weekly markets and annual fairs is all but obsolete. Dis- 



Commerce 



601 



tinctively modern are produce exchanges for trade in the great 
staples (wheat, cotton, wool, sugar, etc.) and stock exchanges 
for buying and selling the stocks and bonds of corporations. 
Speculation on the exchanges confers a benefit upon commerce 
by safeguarding producers against the risks of sharp fluctua- 
tions in prices. When, , , , 



however, it results in an 
artificial scarcity of com- 
modities or securities 
through "corners " and 
"squeezes," it becomes 
an economic evil. The 
difficulty in practice is 
to draw the line between 
legitimate speculation 
and simple gambling. 

The system of insur- 
ance is altogether an eco- 
nomic bene- Insurance 
fit, in view c° m P*mies 

of the risks involved in 
most commercial under- 
takings. For a small 
payment the farmer in- 
sures his growing crop 
against hail or wind- 
storm ; the merchant, 
his stock against fire; 
the shipowner, his vessel 
against loss at sea. Ma- 
rine insurance arose in 

,. , Ti , i L r The Stock Exchange, New York 

medieval Italy, but for 

centuries it has centered in London. The first fire insurance 
policies were written in London after a great fire in the reign of 
Charles II. Other forms of business insurance originated much 
more recently. The present tendency seems to be to insure 
against every possible contingency which can be foreseen. 




602 The Industrial Revolution 

A commercial bank, as distinguished from a savings bank or 
a trust company, may be denned as an institution which deals 
in money and credit. It attracts the deposits of 
many persons, thus gaining control of enormous 
sums available for loans to manufacturers and merchants. 
Banks do not increase the amount of capital (factory buildings, 
machinery, raw materials, etc.) in a community, but they help 
to put it at the disposal of active business men ; in other words, 
banks make capital fluid. Furthermore, bank checks, drafts, 
and foreign bills of exchange provide a cheap and elastic 
substitute for money. It is possible through their use to 
discharge a large volume of indebtedness without the transfer 
of cash. 

The earliest medieval banks were the private establishments 
of moneyed men in Italian cities. Venice and Genoa sub- 
Develop- sequently founded public or state banks, and dur- 
ment of ing the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth 
centuries similar institutions arose in many Euro- 
pean capitals. All the great European banks, as well as the 
national banks of the United States, have the privilege of issu- 
ing redeemable notes which circulate in place of gold. 

In spite of the extensive use of checks and bank notes, the 
growth of commerce continues to absorb immense quantities of 
The gold gold, the money metal. The supply has kept 

supply p ace w i tn t ne demand. The mines of California, 

Australia, South Africa, Alaska, and other countries produced 
in the second half of the nineteenth century nine times as much 
gold as had been produced between 1800 and 1850. 

The supply of silver increased during the nineteenth century 
far in excess of the demand. Its declining value led the principal 
The gold commercial states to diminish or suspend silver 

standard coinage. Great Britain first abandoned the 

double or bimetallic standard and adopted the single gold 
standard. Her example has been followed by the Conti- 
nental nations, the British colonies, Japan, the South American 
republics, and the United States. China and Mexico are the 
only important countries which remain on a silver basis. 



Commerce 603 

The almost universal use of gold as the standard of value 
facilitates the creation of a world market for money. Capital- 
ists and bankers in progressive countries are thus international 
enabled to supply funds for investment in less finance 
progressive countries. Statisticians estimate that up to 1914 
not less than twenty billion dollars had been invested abroad 
by Great Britain, about half of it in her colonies and about 
half in foreign lands. French investments in Russia and 
other countries totaled about ten billion dollars, while those 
of Germany abroad also reached an impressively high figure. 
All through the nineteenth century the United States was a 
debtor nation, owing to the immense sums borrowed for the 
development of American railroads, mines, farms, and factories. 
This situation changed with startling suddenness during the 
World War, when the Allied nations purchased in the United 
States enormous amounts of food, raw materials, and muni- 
tions. Not only has the United States wiped off its indebted- 
ness to Europe ; it has now made Europe its debtor. 

Commercial progress has been frequently interrupted during 
the past century by periods of depression called crises. They 
are a product of the Industrial Revolution. Aris- . 
ing in one country, perhaps as a result of bad 
banking, over-issue of paper money, speculation, unwise in- 
vestments, or failure of crops, they tend to spread widely until 
all civilized countries are involved. What happens during a 
crisis is familiar to every one. Capitalists refuse to invest 
in new railroads, factories, and other undertakings; bankers 
will not lend money; merchants, unable to borrow, go into 
bankruptcy ; and manufacturers, receiving fewer orders, either 
reduce their output or shut down their plants. Then ensues a 
period of "hard times," with low prices, low wages, much un- 
employment, and widespread destitution. The wave of pros- 
perity sets in again, eventually, and times once more become 
"good." Crises have occurred at intervals of about ten or 
eleven years since 1800, but recently with lessening severity. 
They may cease altogether as modern commerce becomes still 
more efficient. 



604 The Industrial Revolution 

Many obstacles impeding the exchange of goods in the 
Middle Ages disappeared in modern times, especially after the 
Commercial French Revolution. State police finally suppressed 
freedom highway robbery. Piracy, once so common, be- 

came obsolete in the era of modern steam navigation. The 
burdensome tolls imposed by feudal lords on transportation 
and travel were no longer exacted, now that feudalism itself 
had died out. A movement also began to reduce the high duties 
levied by every European nation on imports and exports. 

One nation went still further in the nineteenth century and 
adopted free trade. Great Britain, we have learned, enjoyed 
Free trade Dv I ^ I 5 a virtual monopoly in most lines of in- 
in Great dustry. Having no reason to fear the competi- 

tion of foreign manufacturers, it was to her ad- 
vantage to lower or abolish the duties on imports, especially 
those on raw materials. The Younger Pitt, influenced by the 
writings of Adam Smith, began the work of tariff reform ; Sir 
Robert Peel continued it in the 'forties; and Gladstone com- 
pleted it. Great Britain is now a free-trade nation. She im- 
poses no restrictions whatever on exports and levies import 
duties only on a few articles, including coffee, tea, tobacco, 
alcoholic liquors, and sugar. Even these are for revenue, not 
for protection. They do not encourage the production at home 
of anything which can be produced more cheaply abroad. "To 
buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest" is the British 
policy. 

Another feature of the free-trade movement in Great Britain 
was the repeal of the Corn 1 Laws. These laws restricted 
Repeal of or entirely prohibited the importation of wheat 
the Corn or other grains, in the interest of British farmers 

and landlords. Manufacturers, on the other hand, 
objected to legislation which made food dear for the working 
classes. After prolonged agitation the laws were repealed in 
1846. Since then Great Britain has secured the bulk of her 
food abroad, from the fertile wheat areas of the United States 

1 "Corn" to an Englishman means wheat ; to a Scotsman or an Irishman, oats ; 
and to an American, maize, or Indian corn. 



Agriculture and Land Tenure 605 

and the British colonies, and has paid for it with the products 
of her mines and factories. 

The Navigation Acts 1 were repealed three years later, after 
having been in operation for nearly two centuries. Foreign 
ships were henceforth allowed to compete with R epea i f ^e 
those of Great Britain in the carrying trade. Navigation 
Competition has resulted in lower freight rates c ' 
and consequently in cheaper food for the British people. 

The free-trade movement spread to the Continent, where it 
led at first to a general lowering of tariff walls. In the last 
quarter of the nineteenth century, however, Protection on 
France, Germany, and other countries returned the Continent 
to the policy of protection. Rightly or wrongly, they saw in 
protection the means of building up their own "infant in- 
dustries," in order to supply the home market and even to 
compete with Great Britain in the markets of the world. The 
triumph of protectionism thus formed a sequel to the intense 
nationalism which had developed in Europe. The economic 
cooperation of the Allies during the World War and their 
continued cooperation under the League of Nations may lead 
to a reaction in favor of freer commercial intercourse between 

them. 

160. Agriculture and Land Tenure 

The agricultural system of the Middle Ages, with its wasteful 

"open fields" and fallow lands, its backward methods, and its 

scanty yield, began to be revolutionized with the . 

approach of modern times. The Dutch were in the 

the first scientific farmers, and from them English ei gh teentn 

century 

farmers learned many secrets of tillage. Deeper 

plowing, more thorough pulverization of the ground, more 

diligent manuring, the shifting or rotation of crops from field 

to field, so that the soil would not have to lie fallow every 

third year, and the introduction of new crops, including turnips, 

clover, and rye, were some of the improvements which doubled 

the yield of agricultural land. The weight of cattle and sheep 

was also increased by half through careful selection in breeding. 

1 See page 334. 



606 The Industrial Revolution 

The improvements in agriculture have now extended to every 
progressive country. Machinery replaces the ancient scythe, 
. . sickle, flail, and other implements. One machine, 

in the of American invention, not only reaps the grain, 

nineteenth ^ut threshes it, winnows it, and delivers it into 

century ' ' 

sacks at a single operation. The introduction of 
cheap artificial fertilizers makes profitable the cultivation of 
poor lands formerly allowed to lie idle. The advance of en- 
gineering science leads to the reclamation of marshes and arid 
wastes. Finally, steam navigation allows a country to draw 
supplies of wheat, meat, and other foodstuffs from the most 







McCormick Reaper, 1834 

The reaper with a vibrating cutter, as first patented by the inventor. 

distant regions, with the result that the specter of famine, so 

common in the Middle Ages, has well-nigh disappeared from the 

modern world. 

The "open-field" system of cultivation, whereby the same 

person tilled many small strips in different parts of the manor, 

T , was so wasteful of time and labor that medieval 

Inclosures 

farmers began to surrender their scattered strips 
for compact holdings which could be inclosed with hedges or 
fences and cultivated independently. This inclosure move- 
ment continued in western Europe all through the modern 
period, until in the nineteenth century the old "open fields" 
had been practically abandoned in favor of separate farms and 
individual tillage. 

Inclosures meant better farming everywhere, but in Great 
Britain they also helped to create the large estates so character- 



Agriculture and Land Tenure 607 

istic of that country. The lord of the manor, not satisfied with 
inclosing his demesne lands, often managed to inclose those of 
the peasants as well, and even the meadows and British 
forests, which had been formerly used by them landlordlsm 
in common. At the present time ten thousand persons own two- 
thirds of all England and Wales ; seventeen thousand persons 
own nine-tenths of Scotland. The rural population of Great 
Britain consists of a few landlords; numerous tenant farmers 
who rent their farms from the lords ; and a still larger number 
of laborers who work for daily wages and have no interest in 
the soil they till. 

British economists and statesmen have long felt that, as a 
mere matter of national safety, Great Britain ought to raise 
more of her own food supply. Were the country Agrarian 
effectively blockaded in time of war, the starvation reform in 
of its crowded industrial population would soon re- 
sult. As a result of the World War, millions of acres formerly 
withdrawn from cultivation were put under the plow. Efforts 
have also begun to break up the large estates by such heavy 
taxes that it will be no longer profitable to hold them. There 
seems reason to believe that Great Britain may yet become 
what Ireland under the Land Purchase Acts l has already be- 
come — a country of small farmers. 

A considerable part of the agricultural land belonged to the 
French peasants even before the Revolution. Their posses- 
sions increased in the revolutionary era, as the French 

result of legislation confiscating the estates of the peasant pro- 
^ , „i i ii. 1 i o prietorships 

Crown, the Church, and the emigrant nobles/ 

France to-day is emphatically a country of small but prosperous 
and contented farmers. In no European state would a social- 
istic revolution, involving the abolition of private ownership 
of land, have fewer chances of success. 

The agrarian reforms of the French Revolution spread to 

Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, western Germany, and northern 

Italy, where peasant proprietorships are common. They are 

rare in much of Spain and in southern Italy and Sicily. Cen- 

1 See page 487. * See pages 377 and 392. 



6c8 The Industrial Revolution 

tral and eastern Europe remained under the medieval manorial 

system throughout the nineteenth century. The land was 

owned bv a few noble families and was worked 
Land tenure 

in other by peasants, either as tenants or as day laborers. 

Continental Outside of Russia proper, there were five of these 
countries . r r ' 

landed aristocracies : in eastern Germany (Bran- 
denburg, Pomerania, West Prussia, East Prussia), where serf- 
dom disappeared only in the Napoleonic era ; in Austria-Hun- 
gary, where it disappeared during the disorders of 1 848-1 849; 
in the Baltic provinces controlled by nobles of German origin ; 
in Poland and Lithuania ; and in Rumania. The revolutionary 
movements since 19 14 promise to destroy the land monopoly 
of the aristocrats in all these countries. There will arise, in- 
stead, a new democratic society of peasant proprietors. This 
triumph of the small land owner in central and eastern Europe 
must be accounted one of the most important economic results 
of the World War. 

The abolition of Russian serfdom by Alexander II in 1858- 
1 86 1, 1 which freed nearly fifty million people, was followed by 
Land tenure measures establishing a new system of land tenure. 
in Russia ^g no bles were required to sell a portion of their 
estates to the peasants, about half of the agricultural area of 
European Russia thus changing hands. Except in certain 
districts where individual ownership prevailed, the farming land 
was intrusted to the entire village (mir) for redistribution at 
intervals among the inhabitants. All that the peasant really 
possessed in his own right was a house and a garden plot. The 
Russian Revolution of 191 7 broke up the mir economy and also 
enabled the peasants to appropriate the estates of the nobles. 
The Bolsheviki have been obliged to countenance this procedure, 
in order to win the support of the peasantry. If Russia adopts 
complete individual ownership of land, it will mark a significant 
step in the progress of that country, where about nine-tenths 
of the population live wholly or mainly by agriculture. Russia 
may yet develop into one of the most stable of nations because 
its people have their feet on the ground, their own ground. 

1 See page 526. 



The Labor Movement 609 

161. The Labor Movement 

The craft guilds, which modern Europe inherited from the 
Middle Ages, gradually became obsolete after the Industrial 
Revolution. They were out of place in a world Disappear- 
of whirling machinery, crowded factories, free ance of the 

cr3.1t cfuilds 

competition, and the separation of labor and 
capital. Few of them in Great Britain survived the eight- 
eenth century. In France it required a decree of the National 
Assembly to end their existence. Those in Germany did not 
completely disappear until late in the nineteenth century. 

As contrasted with craft guilds, trade unions are combinations 
of wage-earners to maintain or improve the conditions under 
which they labor. These associations began to Rise of trade 
appear in Great Britain between 1700 and 1800, unions 
especially after the domestic system gave way to the factory 
system. Under the new conditions of industry, an employer 
could not know many of his employees personally; their re- 
lations, henceforth, tended to become cold-blooded and im- 
personal. At the same time, the workers in any one establish- 
ment or trade, being thrown more closely together, came to 
realize their common interests and to appreciate the need foi 
organization. 

The unions immediately encountered opposition. The Con- 
mon Law treated them as conspiracies in restraint of trade and 
hence as illegal. Moreover, the employers used Trade unions 
their influence in Parliament to secure the passage P rohlbited 
of a long series of acts designed to prevent what were styled 
"unlawful combinations of workmen." The last of these acts 
even provided the penalty of imprisonment at hard labor for 
persons who combined with others to raise wages, shorten hours, 
or in any way control the conditions of industry. 

Agitation by trade-union leaders induced Parliament in 
1825 to repeal all the Combination Acts and to replace them 
by a new and more liberal statute. Laborers Trade unions 
might now lawfully meet together for the purpose le 8 alized 
of agreeing on the rate of wages or the number of hours which 



610 The Industrial Revolution 

they would work, as long as the agreement concerned only 
those who were present at the meeting. This qualification was 
removed a number of years later. Finally, the Trade Union 
Act of 1875 declared that nothing done by a group of laborers 
should be considered illegal unless it was also illegal when done 
by a single person. The act thus gave the working classes the 
full right of combination for which they had long been striv- 
ing. It has been called the Magna Carta of trade unionism. 

The trade unions of Great Britain have made much progress 
within recent years. They enroll several million factory opera- 
British trade tives, railway workers, coal miners, and agricul- 
unionism tural laborers. They send their representatives to 
Parliament and exercise great influence on labor 
legislation. Their officers also frequently serve as factory 
inspectors. Many unions enjoy a considerable income, which 
goes to support members who are temporarily out of work, sick, 
disabled, or infirm. 

Continental trade unions are modeled upon the British organ- 
izations, but do not equal them in numbers, wealth, or influence. 
Trade union- Many have a political character, being closely 
ism on the connected with socialist parties. In general, Con- 
tinental workingmen rely for improvement in their 
condition rather upon State action than upon collective bar- 
gaining with their employers. 

The cooperative movement also started in Great Britain. 

There are in that country a large number of societies, open to 

_ .. . workingmen on the payment of a small fee, and 
Cooperation ° r J . 

selling goods to members at prices considerably 

lower than those charged by private concerns. Members share 
in the profits in accordance with the amount of their purchases. 
The success of cooperation in retailing has brought about its 
extension to wholesaling and even to manufacturing and bank- 
ing. Similar societies are numerous on the Continent. 

162. Government Regulation of Industry 

Improvement in the lot of the working classes has taken place 
not only through the activities of trade unions, cooperative 



Government Regulation of Industry 611 

societies, and other voluntary associations, but also by legis- 
lation. The need for government regulation of industry very 
soon became apparent. The crowded factories Evils of 
were unsanitary. Hours of labor were too long, the factory 
Wages were on the starvation level. Furthermore, sys em 
the use of machinery encouraged the employment of women 
and children, for whose labor there had been previously little 
demand outside the home. Their excessive toil amid unhealthy 
surroundings often developed disease and deformity or brought 
premature death. Much excuse existed for the passionate 
words of one reformer that the slave trade was "mercy com- 
pared to the factory system." 

These evils were naturally most prominent in Great Britain, 
where the Industrial Revolution began. Little effort was made 
at first to remedy them. The working classes The " let- 
exercised no political influence; indeed, by the alone P° lic y 
Combination Acts they had been prohibited from forming trade 
unions for their protection. Statesmen, instead of meeting 
the situation by remedial legislation, adopted the laissez-faire, 
or "let-alone" policy. 1 The government, they declared, 
should keep its hands off industry. The greatest good to 
the greatest number could only be secured when "economic 
laws" of supply and demand were allowed to determine the 
wages and conditions of employment, just as they determined 
the prices, quantity, and quality of commodities produced. 

"Let alone" naturally became the watchword of selfish 
employers, to whose avarice and cruelty it gave full rein. Yet 
there were also humane employers who felt that Early labor 
the government ought to protect those who could le g lslation 
not protect themselves. After some agitation the first British 
factory act was passed in 1802. This measure, which applied 
only to cotton factories, prohibited the binding-out for 
labor of pauper children under nine years of age, restricted 
their working hours to twelve a day, and forbade night 
work. Little more was done for thirty-one years. During 
this time several philanthropists, among whom Lord Ashley, 

1 See page 355. 



6l2 



The Industrial Revolution 



afterwards earl of Shaftesbury, had the greatest influence, took 
up the cause of the oppressed workers and on the floor of Par- 
liament, on the platform, in the pulpit, and in the newspapers 
waged a campaign to arouse the public to the need of ad- 
ditional legislation. The result was the passage in 1833 of 
an act which applied to all textile factories and provided for 
their regular inspection by public officials. A few years later 

Ashley, whose life was devoted 
to philanthropy and social re- 
form, carried through Parliament 
an act forbidding the employ- 
ment in mines of women and 
children. Parliament subse- 
quently took the still more 
radical step of passing the Ten- 
Hour Act, which limited the 
labor of women and children in 
textile factories to ten hours a 
day. This measure became a 
law only after the fiercest opposi- 
tion on the part of many manu- 
facturers, but it proved so bene- 
ficial that henceforth the desir- 
ability of factory legislation was 
generally admitted. 
Government regulation of industry now began to become a 
reality. Mines, bakeries, laundries, docks, retail and wholesale 
shops, and many other establishments were grad- 
ually brought under control. At the present 
time the State restricts the employment of children 
so that they may not be deprived of an education. It limits 
the hours of labor, not only of children and women in most 
industries, but also of men in mines and factories. It requires 
employers to install safety appliances in their plants and to 
take all other precautions necessary for the preservation of 
the lives, limbs, and health of their employees. Recent legis- 
lation provides for the establishment of wage boards in certain 




The Earl of Shaftesbury 

After a bust by Sir J. E. Boehm, in the 
National Portrait Gallery, London. 



British labor 

legislation 

to-day 



Government Regulation of Industry 613 

"sweated trades," where men and women work long hours 
for starvation pay. These boards, representing employees, 
employers, and the government, have power to fix a minimum 
wage — the lowest wage consistent with health and efficiency — 
and to forbid the payment of anything less, except to appren- 
tices. The principle of the minimum wage has also been ex- 
tended to miners and agricultural laborers. The government 
supports employment bureaus or labor exchanges, in order that 
the idle may find work. A national insurance act provides 
for the compulsory insurance of nearly all employees against 
sickness and loss of employment. An old-age pension law 
gives British subjects who have reached seventy years of age and 
who receive an income not exceeding £31, lod. (about $150) a 
year, a maximum pension of 55. (about $1.25) weekly. It is 
now proposed that every citizen of the United Kingdom, irre- 
spective of his income, shall be qualified to draw a pension, upon 
reaching the required age. 

The labor legislation of France, Belgium, Holland, Austria, 
and the Scandinavian states compares favorably with that of 
Great Britain. In no Continental country has Labor legis- 
it gone farther than in Germany. Bismarck lation on the 
gave it his powerful support, in order to check the 
spread of socialism. Germany has laws establishing a maximum 
number of working hours, limiting child and female labor, and 
providing a system of workingmen's insurance against accidents, 
sickness, incapacity, and old age. 

The youthful commonwealths of Australia and New Zealand, 
unhampered by tradition, are trying a number of interesting 
experiments in government regulation of industry. Australasian 
Both countries give compensation to workingmen labor legisla- 
injured by accidents and old-age pensions to poor 
people. New Zealand, in addition, provides fire, life, and ac- 
cident insurance, conducts postal savings banks, rents model 
homes to workingmen, and makes arbitration of labor disputes 
compulsory, in order to do away with strikes. If it turns out 
that under such paternalism more people are free and happy 
than under the individualism which prevails in the United 



6 14 The Industrial Revolution 

States and even in Great Britain, then Australia and New 
Zealand will have set an example to the rest of the world ; if 
it is found that too much public regulation cramps private 
enterprise and takes away the incentive to industry, they will 
have warned the rest of the world off a dangerous course. 
But all this legislation is too recent for final judgment to be 
pronounced upon it. 

There has been a growing movement within recent years 
to secure concerted action by the various nations in the interest 
international °f tne working classes. The movement received 
labor official recognition at the Peace Conference in 

legislation ^^ The p eace Treaty with Germany estab- 
lishes a permanent International Labor Office, under the League 
of Nations, and provides for annual international labor con- 
ferences to discuss needed legislation and recommend it to 
the different governments. Like the League of Nations of 
which it forms a part, this new labor machinery has only begun 
to function, but it promises to become an agency of enormous 

usefulness. 

163. Public Ownership 

The modern State, in all civilized countries, does many 
things which private individuals themselves did during the 
Extension Middle Ages. It maintains an army and navy, 
of state administers justice, provides a police system, and 

furnishes public education. No one now ques- 
tions either the need or the desirability of such activities. As 
we have just learned, the State also subjects private industry 
to ever-increasing regulation for the benefit of the less fortu- 
nate members of society. Furthermore, it engages in a variety 
of industrial undertakings. 

Governments sometimes monopolize different branches of 
business in order to raise a revenue. A good instance is the 
tobacco monopoly of France. The post office is always in 
Examples government hands, not so much for revenue as 
of State for the furtherance of cheap communication be- 

enterpnse t ween different parts of the country. In Great 
Britain and on the Continent telegraphs and telephones are 



Public Ownership 615 

managed by the government in connection with the post office, 
and the government parcel post does all the business which in the 
United States is partly absorbed by private express companies. 
Coinage is everywhere a public function, as well as banking in 
most European countries. In the United States banks are 
private institutions under state or national regulation. Ger- 
many and Russia have public forests; Prussia has public 
mines; and France has a number of canals belonging to the 
government. 

On the Continent (Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, 
Austria, Russia) railroads are mostly State-owned and State- 
managed. Nearly all the French lines are pri- 
vately owned, but they will revert to the govern- 
ment upon the expiration of their franchises. Great Britain 
and the United States took over their railroads for military 
purposes during the World War. The American lines, together 
with the express companies, have now been returned to private 
ownership. In Australia the government built the principal 
railroads and owns and operates all of them. 

Both British and Continental cities generally own and oper- 
ate such public utilities as street railways, gas and electric 
lighting plants, and waterworks. Markets, slaugh- Municipal 
ter houses, baths, pawn shops, docks, and harbor enter P nse 
improvements are likewise often municipal monopolies. In the 
United States municipal ownership has been common in the 
case of waterworks, somewhat less common in the case of elec- 
tric lighting plants, rare in that of gas plants, and scarcely known 
in that of street railways. Since free competition cannot pre- 
vail in these industries, the only choice is between municipal 
ownership or private ownership subject to municipal regulation 
of charges and service. 

It must now be obvious that the laissez-faire policy finds 
few adherents at the present time. Defense against external 
aggression, preservation of internal order, and the Decline of 
maintenance of a few public institutions do not laissez " faire 
exhaust the responsibilities of the State, as these are conceived 
to-day. The reaction against laissez-faire has been very marked 



616 The Industrial Revolution 

during the last half century, one reason being the success of 
Germany in public regulation and ownership. Continental 
countries go farther in this direction than either Great Britain 
or the United States, because the Continental peoples have 
been accustomed to paternal rule for centuries. But as Aus- 
tralia and New Zealand show, even English-speaking peoples 
tend to abandon that system of "natural liberty" which, in 
Adam Smith's words, leaves every man "perfectly free to 
pursue his own interest in his own way, and to bring both his 
industry and capital into competition with those of any other 
man or order of men." 

164. Socialism 

Contemporary socialists unite in making the following de- 
mands. First, the State shall own and operate the instruments 
What of production, that is, land and capital. Under 

socialism is fyis arrangement rent, interest, and profits, as 
sources of personal income, would disappear, and private 
property would consist simply of one's own clothing, household 
goods, money, and perhaps a house and a garden plot. Second, 
the leisure class shall be eliminated by requiring everybody 
to perform useful labor, either physical or mental. Third, 
the income of the State shall be distributed as wages and salaries 
among the workers, according to some fairer principle than 
obtains at present. 

Socialism, thus explained, is not identical with public owner- 
ship of railroads, telegraphs, telephones, the postal service, 
What and other utilities. There is still a leisure class 

socialism and there are still personal incomes in those 
countries where public ownership has been most 
completely developed. Similarly, labor legislation is not prop- 
erly described as socialistic, since it fails to abolish private 
property, the factory system, and rent, interest, and profits. 

Socialism is, in part, an outcome of the Industrial Revolution, 
which completed the separation of capital and labor. The 
gulf between the capitalists and the landless, propertyless, 
wage-earning proletariat became wider, the contrasts between 



Socialism 



617 



rich and poor became sharper, than ever before. Vastly more 

wealth was now produced than in earlier ages, but it was still 

unequally distributed. The few had too much ; _ . ,. 
,,,,., Socialism 

the many had too little. Radical reformers, dis- and the 

tressed by these inequalities and dissatisfied with Industrial 
J r 1 1 Revolution 

the slow progress of the labor movement and 

government regulation of industry, began to proclaim the< 

necessity of a wholesale reconstruction of society. 

In Great Britain the most prominent of these early radicals 

was Robert Owen, a rich manufacturer and philanthropist, 

who did much to improve the conditions of life „ . ^ 

Robert Owen, 

for his employees. Among his innovations were and coopera- 

cooperative shops, where workmen could buy tive ?°. m ~ 
, . , . mumties 

good things cheaply and divide the profits between 

them. This principle of cooperative distribution subsequently 
attained great success in England, 
and Owen deserves credit as its 
originator. He also advocated 
cooperation in production. His 
special remedy for social ills was 
the establishment of small co- 
operative communities, each one 
living by itself on a tract of land 
and producing in common every- 
thing needed for its support. He 
thought that this arrangement 
would retain the economic ad- 
vantages of the great inventions 
without introducing the factory 
system. Owen's experiments in 
cooperation all failed, including 
the one which he established at New Harmony, Indiana. Owen 
thus belongs in the class of Utopian socialists, men who dreamed 
of ideal social systems which were never realized. 

Socialism is also, in part, an outcome of the French Revo- 
lution. That upheaval destroyed so many time-hallowed in- 
stitutions and created so many new ones that it gave a great 




Robert Owen 
After a plaster medallion by Miss Beech. 



618 The Industrial Revolution 

impetus to schemes for the regeneration of society. French 
radical thinkers soon set out to purge the world of capitalism 
Socialism and as tne ^ r fathers had purged it of feudalism. Their 
the French ideas began to become popular with workingmen 
after the factory system, with its attendant evils, 
gained an entrance into France. 

The workers found a leader in Louis Blanc, a journalist and 
author of wide popularity. The revolution of 1789, he declared, 
Louis Blanc ^ a( ^ benefited the peasants ; that of 1830 the 
and national capitalists or bourgeoisie ; the next must be for 
the benefit of the proletariat. Blanc believed 
that every man had an inalienable right to remunerative em- 
ployment. To provide it, he proposed that the State should 
furnish the capital for national workshops. These were to be 
managed by the operatives themselves, who would divide the 
profits of the industry between them and thus eliminate capi- 
talists altogether. Blanc's ideas triumphed for a time in the 
"February Revolution" of 1848, which had been brought about 
by the Parisian proletariat. The second French Republic ex- 
pressly recognized the "right to labor, " set up the national work- 
shops, and promised two francs a day to every registered work- 
ingman. The drain upon the treasury and the demoralization 
of the people by this State charity soon led to the abandonment 
of the entire scheme. The result was a popular uprising only 
crushed by military force. It should be said in justice to Blanc 
that the government appears to have purposely mismanaged 
the national workshops, in order to discredit the socialistic move- 
ment in France. 

Meanwhile, a new socialism, more systematic and practical 
than the old, began to be developed by German thinkers. Its 
Karl Marx, chief representative was Karl Marx. His parents 
1818-1883 were well-to-do Jews who had embraced Chris- 
tianity. Marx as a young man studied at several German 
universities and received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 
Becoming interested in economic subjects, he founded a socialist 
newspaper to advocate the cause of the working classes. The 
government suppressed it, after the failure of the revolutionary 



Socialism 



619 



^ 

"1^. 



m £1 



^Jwf^-y. 



movement of 1848-1849, and expelled Marx from Germany. 

He went to London and lived there in exile for the rest of his 

days, rinding time, in the midst of a hard struggle for existence, 

to write his famous work, Das Kapital. 1 It has a place beside 

Rousseau's Social Contract and Smith's Wealth of Nations among 

the books which have profoundly influenced human thought and 

action. 

Marx felt little sympathy with Utopian schemes to make 

over society. In opposition to Owen, Blanc, and other earlier 

socialists, he sought to build up a system of __ 

' ° . Marxism 

socialism based on economic principles. Put in 

its simplest form, Marxism asserts that, while labor is the 

source of all value, laborers 



receive, in fact, only a frac- 
tion of what they produce. 
All the rest goes to the 
capitalistic bourgeoisie, or 
middle class, who produce 
nothing. Capitalism, how- 
ever, is the inevitable re- 
sult of the factory system. 
Like feudalism, it forms a 
stage, a necessary stage, in || 
the development of man- 
kind. It is fated to disap- 
pear with the progress of 
democracy, which, by giving 
the proletariat the vote, 

will enable them to displace the bourgeoisie, take production 
into their own hands, and peacefully inaugurate the socialist 
state. 

During the 'seventies of the last century the co-workers 
of Marx in Germany founded the Social Democratic Party. 
The government, under Bismarck's leadership, tried to suppress 
it by prohibiting meetings of socialists and the circulation of 

1 The first volume of Das Kapital appeared in 1867. The second and third 
volumes were not published until after Marx's death. 




Karl Marx 



620 The Industrial Revolution 

socialist literature. Any effort to propagate socialist doctrine 
was made punishable by fines and imprisonment. The police 
The Social were also authorized to deport all suspected per- 
Democratic sons. Persecution failed to check the movement, 
which grew phenomenally. However, many per- 
sons voting for Social Democratic candidates were not socialists, 
but German liberals who wanted to protest as effectively as 
possible against autocracy and militarism. 

The Social Democratic Party provided a model for similar 
organizations of Marxian socialists in Great Britain, France, 
National Italy, Austria, Russia, and the other European 

socialist countries, as well as in the United States, Aus- 

par les tralia, and Japan. Congresses of delegates from 

the national parties have been held from time to time, in order 
to bring together the working classes of every land. In 1914 
the socialists throughout the world polled about eleven million 
votes and elected over seven hundred representatives to the 
various parliaments. 

165. Poverty and Progress 

The most important consequence of the Industrial Revolu- 
tion is the increased population of the leading nations. The 
Increase of figures for Europe show an increase from about 
population 175,000,000 to over 400,000,000 during the nine- 
teenth century, and for the continental United States from 
about 5,000,000 in 1800 to over 105,000,000 in 1920. The 
number of people who can be supported in a given region now 
depends less on the food which they raise, than on their pro- 
duction of raw materials and manufactured goods to exchange 
for food. Thus Belgium and Great Britain, with only a limited 
agriculture, support more inhabitants to the square mile than 
any other countries. There are, of course, certain agricultural 
countries (Egypt, the Ganges valley and delta in India, part of 
China) where the exceptionally rich soil, coupled with a very 
low standard of living on the part of the inhabitants, has also 
made possible an enormous growth of population within the 
last century. Little of the world is now entirely uninhabited; 



Poverty and Progress 621 

still less is permanently uninhabitable and unlikely to receive 
a considerable population in the future. Even sandy and alka- 
line deserts can be rendered productive through irrigation, 
while vast tracts of fertile territory, in both the temperate and 
tropical zones, can support many more people than at present. 

The increased population of the leading industrial nations 
has been largely concentrated in cities. The rise of the factory 
system and the improvement of facilities for concentra- 
travel and transportation soon led to an unprece- tion of 
dented urban development. Old cities grew 
with marvelous rapidity, while former villages and towns 
became transformed into new cities. The concentration of 
population is well illustrated in the case of the United States. 
This country in 1800 contained only six cities of over eight 
thousand inhabitants; now, according to the census of 1920, 
more than half of the American people are city dwellers. 

The Industrial Revolution is further chiefly responsible for 
the enormous emigration of Europeans during the past hundred 
years to lands beyond the seas. The United E . 
States received over 27,000,000 immigrants be- 
tween 1800 and 1910, nearly all coming from Europe. Mil- 
lions more went to the British colonies and to South America. 
The migration movement has been most marked since the middle 
of the nineteenth century, when the improvements in steam 
navigation so greatly multiplied and cheapened facilities for 
travel on the ocean. 

The increased wealth of the leading nations is another con- 
sequence of the Industrial Revolution. Statistics of govern- 
ment revenues and expenditures, imports and ex- increase of 
ports, income tax returns, deposits in savings banks, wealth 
and assets of life insurance companies show how wealth has 
multiplied, especially within recent years. Other indications 
are furnished by the increase in the annual production of coal, 
in the amount of iron ore mined annually, in railway construc- 
tion, and in the tonnage of merchant vessels. The enormous 
public loans, successfully floated during the World War, also 
reveal the resources now at the command of industrial peoples. 



622 The Industrial Revolution 

Notwithstanding the creation of huge individual fortunes 
as the result of the Industrial Revolution, the general standard 
Diffusion of of living has been raised by the addition of in- 
wealth numerable things — sugar, coffee, linen, cotton 

goods, glass, chinaware, wall paper, ready-made clothing, books, 
newspapers, pictures — which were once enjoyed only by a 
few wealthy persons. If the rich are undoubtedly getting 
richer, the poor are not getting poorer in western Europe and 
the United States. As a matter of fact, poverty is most acute 
in such thickly populated countries as Russia, India, and 
China, which modern industrialism has only begun to pene- 
trate. 

Nevertheless, no one conversant with social conditions in 
large cities can deny the existence there of very many people 
Causes of below or scarcely above the poverty line. So- 
poverty cialists allege that poverty is caused by the un- 

equal and inequitable distribution of wealth under the pres- 
ent economic organization of society. The truth seems to be 
that no single condition — over-population, property in land, 
competition, the factory system — explains poverty, for each 
one has been absent in previous social stages. The causes of 
poverty, in fact, are as complex as modern life, some being due 
to faults of personal character or physical and mental defects, 
and others being produced by lack of education, bad surround- 
ings, corrupt or inefficient government, and economic condi- 
tions which result in lack of employment, high cost of living, 
monopolies, and the like. 

Since there is no single cause of poverty, there can be no 
single remedy for it. Putting aside socialism as undesirable, 
Prevention one may still look forward confidently to the 
and abolition prevention of much poverty by trade-union ac- 
tivity, by government regulation of industry (in- 
cluding old-age pensions, State insurance against sickness and 
disability, protection against non-employment, and the mini- 
mum wage), by education of the unskilled, by improved hous- 
ing, and by all the agencies and methods of private philan- 
thropy. One may even reasonably anticipate the complete 



Poverty and Progress 623 

abolition of poverty, at least all suffering from hunger, cold, and 
nakedness, in those progressive countries which have already 
abolished slavery and serfdom. Indeed, with the increase 
of wages, the growing demand for intelligent work, and the 
spread of popular education, skilled laborers have multiplied 
so rapidly as to outnumber those whose labor is entirely un- 
skilled; they belong no longer to the "lower classes," but al- 
ready live better than did the majority of the upper classes 
before the Industrial Revolution. 

The evils of modern industrialism, though real, have been 
exaggerated. They are and were the evils accompanying the 
transition from one stage of society to another. Economic 
Few would wish now to retrace their steps to an democrac y 
age when there were no factories, no railroads, and no great 
mechanical inventions. Machinery now does much of the 
roughest and hardest work and, by saving human labor, makes 
it possible to shorten hours of toil. The world's workers, in 
consequence, have opportunities for recreation and education 
previously denied them. After one hundred and fifty years of 
modern industrialism, we begin to see that, besides helping 
to produce political democracy, it is also creating economic 
democracy. It is gradually diffusing the necessaries and com- 
forts, and even many of the luxuries of life, among all peoples 
in all lands. 

Studies 

1. For what are the following persons famous: Arkwright; Cartwright; Watt; 
Stephenson; Whitney; Fulton; Morse; Bell; Langley; and Marconi? 2. Ex- 
plain what is meant by the following : (a) capital ; (6) capitalism ; (c) domestic sys- 
tem; (d) factory system; and (e) division of labor. 3. Name in order the early 
inventions in the textile industry and explain the changes which each one produced. 
4. On the map, page sgo, indicate the principal manufacturing districts and cities 
of Great Britain. 5. "Of all inventions, the alphabet and the printing press alone 
excepted, those inventions which abridge distance have done most for the civili- 
zation of our species." Comment on this statement. 6. "Next to steam-locomo- 
tion, the telegraph is probably the most powerful mechanical agent invented for 
promoting the unification of the world." Comment on this statement. 7. Show 
how modern commerce has been facilitated by the submarine cable, wireless teleg- 
raphy, the postal system, and marine insurance, or underwriting. 8. How has 
the construction of the Suez and Panama canals affected oceanic trade routes? 
9. Why did Great Britain adopt a free-trade policy? Why does she maintain it, 



624 



The Industrial Revolution 



when other nations follow a policy of protection? 10. Comment on some of the 
social effects of peasant proprietorships, n. Compare the modern trade union 
with the medieval craft guild. 12. Why must labor legislation, to become entirely 
effective, be international in scope? 13. Is it true, as Marx asserted, that labor is 
the source of all value? 14. Mention some of the probable advantages and some 
of the probable disadvantages of the socialist state. 15. "The growth of large 
cities constitutes perhaps the greatest of all the problems of modern civilization." 
Comment on this statement. 16. Why may the Industrial Revolution be considered 
as an "era still in progress"? 17. Using material in encyclopedias, prepare 
reports for class presentation upon the following inventions and discoveries: (a) 
the bicycle; (b) the typewriter; (c) lucifer matches; (d) illuminating gas; (e) 
electric lighting; (J) dynamite; and (g) photography. 




Spinning, Carding, and Weaving in the Middle Ages 



CHAPTER XVIII 
MODERN CIVILIZATION 

166. Internationalism 

The world, which seemed so large to our forefathers, to us 
seems very small and compact. Railroads, steamships, and 
airplanes bind the nations together, and the tele- unity of 
graph, the submarine cable, and the "wireless" ™° d . ern . 
keep them in constant communication. The 
oceans, no longer barriers, serve as highways uniting East and 
West, Orient and Occident. Commerce and finance are inter- 
national; capital finds investment in foreign countries as 
readily as at home ; and trade unionism, labor legislation, and 
socialism become common to all the world. National isolation 
disappears as ideas and ideals tour the globe. 

Everywhere people build the same houses, use the same 
furniture, and eat the same food. Everywhere they enjoy 
the same amusements and distractions : concerts, uniformity 
"moving pictures," the theater, clubs, magazines, of modern 
automobiles. They also dress alike. Powder, 
gold lace, wigs, pigtails, three-cornered hats, knee breeches, 
silk stockings, and silver-buckled shoes passed away in revolu- 
tionary France with the other follies of the Old Regime, and 
the loose coat and long trousers of the working classes became 
the accepted style for men's apparel, not only in France, but 
eventually in all civilized countries. Women's apparel still 
changes year by year, but the new fashions, emanating from 
Paris, London, or New York, are speedily copied in San 
Francisco, Melbourne, and Tokio. 

The inconveniences resulting from the diversity of languages 
were never greater than to-day, when travel is a general habit 
and when nations read one another's books and profit by 

625 



626 



Modern Civilization 



one another's discoveries and inventions. The international- 
ism of modern literature, science, philosophy, and art de- 
Universal mands an international medium of expression, 
languages Latin was the speech of learned men in Europe 
throughout the Middle Ages, and French has been the speech 
of polite society and diplomacy for more than two centuries. 

What is needed, how- 
ever, is a universal lan- 
guage, which can be 
readily mastered by any 
one. Crude attempts at 
such a language have al- 
ready appeared in Vola- 
piik and Esperanto, but 
a really satisfactory arti- 
ficial idiom remains to 
be created. 

Meanwhile, the spread 
of English-speaking peo- 
The English pies through- 
language out the globe 
seems destined to make 
English, in some sort, a 
universal language. It 
is now used by perhaps 
,, im( , lul TASTl . oi; . THK u !t i 7 5mimonpeople,either 

Absurdity" as their mother Ian- 

One of the many caricatures of the extravagant g ua g e or as an acquired 
fashions in headdress of both sexes during the eighteenth tOngUC 1 Those Using 

Russian are estimated at 
ioo millions; German, 80 millions; Italian, 50 millions; Spanish, 
50 millions, and French, 40 millions. The simple grammar and 
cosmopolitan vocabulary of English adapt it to an international 
role. In spite of an often arbitrary spelling and pronunciation, 




"United Kingdom, 45,000,000; Canada and Australia, 12,000,000; British 
Africa, 5,000,000; British India and other possessions, 3,000,000; the United 
States, 110,000,000. ... 



Internationalism 627 

it is more easily learned than any other of the great languages 
of the world. 

The idea of a universal exposition, to which all countries 
should send their art treasures or the marvels of their industry, 
first took shape in the Crystal Palace Exhibition Universal 
(London, 1851). Since then European expositions ex P 0Sltl0ns 
have been numerous, each one larger than its predecessor. 
The Universal Exhibition (Paris, 1900) attracted 51,000,000 
visitors. The United States began with the Philadelphia 
Centennial of 1876. This was followed by the World's Fair 
at Chicago in 1893 and by the more recent expositions at St. 
Louis and San Francisco. 

World congresses are constantly being held to deal with such 
matters of common interest as the metric system of weights 
and measures, monetary standards, protection The « j nter _ 
of patents and copyrights, improvement in the national 
condition of the working classes, advancement of 
social reform, woman suffrage, and the establishment of uni- 
versal peace. Two thousand such gatherings took place in the 
half century immediately preceding the World War. Some of 
them have resulted in the formation of permanent organiza- 
tions such as the Red Cross Society 1 and the Postal Union. 2 
Frequent meetings of distinguished scholars and men of letters 
from the different countries also help to produce what has been 
well called the "international mind." 

Increased intercourse between civilized peoples not only 
broadens their outlook but also widens their sympathies. Feel- 
ings of human brotherhood, once limited in pre- The ■« inter- 
historic times to the members of one's clan or national 
tribe and during antiquity and the Middle Ages to 
one's city or state, expand to include all mankind. There 
develops an "international conscience," which emphasizes the 
obligations of the strong toward the weak and protests against 
the oppression of any members of the world community by 
any others. Let us consider some of its manifestations during 
the past century. 

1 See page 632. 2 See page 599. 



628 Modern Civilization 

167. Social Betterment 

Little more than one hundred years ago the slave trade was 
generally regarded as a legitimate business. Hardly any one 
Abolition of thought it wrong to kidnap or purchase African 
the slave negroes, pack them on shipboard, where many 
died in the stifling holds, and carry them to the 
West Indies or the American mainland to be sold as slaves. 
It is estimated that by the close of the eighteenth century 
more than three million negroes were brought to the New 
World and that at least a quarter of a million more perished 
on the way thither. Denmark first abolished this shameful 
traffic. Great Britain and the United States took the same 
step in 1 807-1 808, and in subsequent years the Continental 
nations, one after another, agreed that it should no longer 
enjoy the protection of their flags. Since the last decade of the 
nineteenth century the European powers have also taken con- 
certed measures to stamp out what remains of the slave trade 
in the interior of the Dark Continent. 

Slavery was all but extinct in Christian lands by the close 
of the Middle Ages. It revived, on a much larger scale, after 
Abolition the era of geographical discovery, which opened 

of slavery U p Africa as a source of slaves and America as a 
field for their profitable employment. The French revolution- 
ists abolished slavery in the colonies of France, but Napoleon 
restored it. Great Britain in 1833 passed an act to free the 
slaves in the British West Indies, paying one hundred million 
dollars to their former masters as compensation. This aboli- 
tion of slavery, as well as of the slave trade, is a monument to 
the humanitarian labors of William Wilberforce, who for nearly 
half a century devoted his wealth, his energies, and his power- 
ful oratory to the cause of the oppressed negroes. Within the 
next thirty years slavery peacefully disappeared in the colonial 
possessions of France, Portugal, and Holland, but in the United 
States only at the cost of civil war. Brazil, in 1888, was the 
last Christian state to put an end to slavery. 

The penal code of eighteenth-century Europe must be de- 



Social Betterment . 629 

scribed as barbarous. Torture of an accused person, in order 
to obtain a confession, usually preceded his trial. Only a few 
nations, Great Britain among them, forbade its The old 
use. Prisons were private property, and the in- penal code 
mates, whether innocent or guilty, had to pay their keeper for 
food and other necessaries. Men, women, and children were 
herded together, the hardened criminals with the first offenders. 
Branding, flogging, and exposure in the pillory formed common 
punishments. Death was the punishment for murder, arson, 
burglary, horse-stealing, theft, forgery, counterfeiting, and 
many other crimes. The British code included over two hun- 
dred capital offenses. A man (or a woman) might be hanged 
for stealing as little as five shillings from a shop or for picking a 
pocket to the value of a single shilling. Transportation to 
America or to Australia was often substituted, however, for 
the death penalty. Executions took place in public, on the 
mistaken theory that to see them would deter from crime. 

The great name in penal reform is that of the Italian Bec- 
caria, whose Essay on Crimes and Punishments appeared in 
1764. It bore early fruit in the general abolition R e f orm f 
of torture and of such ferocious punishments as the penal 
burning alive, breaking on the wheel, and draw- 
ing and quartering. Penal reform in France was hastened by 
the Revolution. Great Britain from about 181 5 began to re- 
duce the number of capital offenses, until only high treason, 
piracy, and murder remained. One consequence of the re- 
form was a striking diminution of crime, though judges and 
other conservative persons had predicted just the reverse. 
Capital punishment has now been abolished by several European 
countries, including Italy, Portugal, Holland, Norway, and 
Rumania. A few American states do not inflict the death 
penalty. 

Prison reform accompanied the reform of the criminal code. 
One of the leaders of this humanitarian movement was a Quak- 
eress, Mrs. Elizabeth Fry. Much has been done Prison 
within the past century to improve sanitary con- reform 
ditions in prisons, to abolish the lock-step, striped clothing, 



630 



Modern Civilization 




Elizabeth Fry 



and other humiliating practices 
in the treatment of prisoners, 
and, by means of juvenile courts 
and reformatories, to separate 
first offenders from hardened 
criminals. Even as regards the 
latter, the idea is now to make 
confinement less a punishment 
than a means of developing 
the convict's self-respect and 
manhood, so that he may re- 
turn to free life a useful mem- 
'• ber of society. Prison reform 
in the various countries has 
been much advanced by inter- 
national congresses. 
The modern attitude toward the feeble-minded and the in- 
sane contrasts sharply with earlier ideas concerning them. 
Treatment Mentally defective persons are 
of defectives no i on g er regarded with amuse- 
ment or contempt, but are rather considered 
as pitiful victims of heredity or of circum- 
stances for which they were not responsible. 
Every civilized country now provides asy- 
lums for their proper care under medical 
supervision. There are also special schools 
for the benefit of the blind and of the deaf 
and dumb. 

An increasing sympathy with the brute 
creation also characterizes our age. The 
Treatment of British Society for the Preven- 
animals t j on Q f Cmdtv to Animals was 

founded in 1824. Ten years later Parlia- 
ment did away with bull baiting and cock 
fighting, which had long been favorite 
amusements of the lower classes, and pro- 
hibited cruel treatment of all domestic 




A Lunatic 



After an eighteenth cen- 
tury engraving, showing a 
lunatic, barefoot, scantily 
clothed, and chained by 
the neck to a wall. 



Social Betterment 



631 



j^T^t. 



animals. Similar legislation has been enacted on the Continent, 
as well as in the United States. 

The crusade against alcoholism further illustrates humani- 
tarian progress. The use of intoxicants, formerly uncon- 
demned, more and more comes under moral repro- Abolition of 
bation, as it is realized that they form one of the the liquor ^ 
most potent agencies of man's degeneration. The 
World War led Russia to abolish the government monopoly 
of vodka and other countries to restrict the consumption of 
alcoholic liquors. Norway and Belgium have adopted partial 
prohibition (excluding beer and light 
wines), while Finland has declared for 
unlimited prohibition. Abolition of 
the liquor traffic in the United States 
was long agitated by private organ- 
izations, such as the Women's Christian 
Temperance Union (under the presi- 
dency of Miss Frances E. Willard) 
and more recently by the Anti-Saloon 
League. Maine early adopted legal 
prohibition. Many states in the Middle 
West and the South subsequently took 
the same action. Prohibition senti- 
ment became at length so strong that a 
constitutional amendment, forbidding 
the manufacture, sale, or transportation 
of intoxicating liquors throughout the country, and their im- 
portation into it, was ratified in 1918-1919 by more than three- 
fourths of the state legislatures. This Eighteenth Amendment 
went into effect one year after ratification. 

Efforts to relieve poverty and suffering have given rise to 
charity organization societies, associations for improving the 
condition of the poor, dispensaries, anti-tuber- phiian- 
culosis leagues, fresh-air funds, and numerous thropic 
other philanthropic agencies in both Europe and agei 
America. The Salvation Army was started in Great Britain 
by William Booth, a Methodist minister, with the idea of better- 




William Booth 



632 Modern Civilization 

ing both the physical and spiritual condition of those who are 
not reached by other religious bodies. The Young Men's 
Christian Association also arose in Great Britain. The Inter- 
national Red Cross Society, with headquarters at Geneva, has 
now become a world-wide institution for the relief of all suffer- 
ing, whether caused by war or by pestilence, floods, fire, or 
other calamities. It is the greatest single agency at work for 
the amelioration of mankind. 

168. Emancipation of Women and Children 

Woman's position in Europe a century ago was what it had 
been in the Middle Ages — a position of dependence on man. 
Disabilities She received little or no education, seldom en- 
of woman gaged in Anything but housework, and for support 
relied on husband, father, or brother. After marriage she 
became subject to her husband. In Great Britain she could 
neither make a will nor enter into a contract without his con- 
sent. All her possessions belonged to him. Any money that 
she earned or inherited was his and might be taken to pay 
his debts. The law even deprived her of control over her 
own children. Similar disabilities rested upon Continental 
women. 

The humanitarian sentiment evoked by the French Revo- 
lution began by freeing slave and serf, but presently demanded 
Woman's the emancipation of woman also. The demand 
rights received a powerful impetus from the Industrial 

Revolution, which opened new employments to woman out- 
side the home and thus lessened her economic dependence on 
man. The agitation for woman's rights has so far succeeded 
that most civilized countries now permit her to own property, 
engage in business, and enter the professions on her own account. 
Her educational opportunities have also steadily widened, 
until to-day both elementary and higher education are open 
to women in most European countries. 

Woman suffrage scored its first victories in Scandinavia. 
During the decade before the World War, both Finland and 
Norway permitted women to vote at general elections. Den- 



Emancipation of Women and Children 633 

mark and Sweden extended voting privileges to women shortly 
after the outbreak of the war. The women of Holland have 
now received full suifrage, and those of Belgium, woman 
partial suffrage. Republican Germany, Austria, suffrage 
Czecho- Slovakia, and Poland give women the vote. 
The Equal Franchise Act, 1 passed by the British Parliament in 
1918, practically doubles the electorate of the United Kingdom. 
Australia and New Zealand also have woman suffrage. 

As far back as 1869, when the Fifteenth Amendment to the 
Constitution, granting suffrage to negroes, was before Con- 
gress, Miss Susan B. Anthony and her associates 
appealed to the legislators for the recognition of suffrage in 
women as well. The appeal was denied. The ^ e Umted 
women then organized the National Woman 
Suffrage Association and began a campaign of education to 
convince thinking people of the 
justice of their cause. Years 
passed without much apparent 
progress being made. Wyoming, 
when admitted to statehood, gave 
the ballot to women, and by 1918 
fourteen other states had done the 
same. Finally, the constitutional 
amendment for woman suffrage 
(sometimes called the "Susan B. 
Anthony Amendment"), which 
had been constantly before Con- 
gress for forty years, received the SusAN B - Anth o n * 

approval of that body and was After a photograph taken at the age of 48. 

speedily ratified by three-fourths of the states in 1920. With 
its ratification the United States has established complete politi- 
cal democracy. 

The divorce laws of the Christian world exhibit a bewildering 
variety. Roman Catholic countries, including Italy and Spain 
(and Portugal until the recent revolution there), preserve the 
medieval conception of marriage as a sacrament and therefore 

1 See page 478. 




634 Modern Civilization 

do not allow divorce under any circumstances. The same is 

true of most Latin American states. Countries adhering to the 

_. Greek Church allow divorce. Those governed or 

Divorce . ° 

influenced by the Code Napoleon, in particular, 

France, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, and Germany, do the 
same. Divorce is rare in Great Britain, as well as in Canada. 
The laws of the United States present no uniformity, some states 
permitting divorce on much easier terms than others. This 
country now grants more divorces than all the rest of Christen- 
dom. In general, modern legislation tends to treat marriage 
as a civil contract and to permit its dissolution for immorality, 
cruelty, desertion, habitual drunkenness, and serious crime, 
that is, for such behavior of one party to the contract as 
makes married life impossible or unbearable to the other 
party. 

The decline of the husband's power over his wife has been 
accompanied by a decline of the father's authority over his 
Emancipation children. Among early peoples, the ancient 
of children Romans for example, the father's control of his 
offspring was absolute, and their liberty was often sacrificed to 
his despotic rule. The Roman idea of family obligations sur- 
vived in Europe through the Middle Ages and still lingers in 
Latin countries at the present time. In Anglo-Saxon countries, 
on the other hand, both law and custom regard the grown-up 
child as independent of the father. Even his authority over 
minors is considered mainly in the light of guardianship. This 
liberal conception of paternal rights bids fair to prevail among 
all civilized peoples. 

169. Popular Education and the Higher Learning 

The schools of the Middle Ages were neither public nor free 
nor secular. All were private schools where pupils paid fees 
Popular for their tuition, and almost all were founded and 

education conducted by the clergy. The beginnings of popu- 
lar education reach back to the Reformation era, when ele- 
mentary schools, supported by general taxation, began to 
spring up in Germany, Holland, Scotland, and Puritan New 



Popular Education and the Higher Learning 635 

England. This free common school system, which it is the 
glory of the reformers to have established, gradually spread 
throughout the United States during the nineteenth century 
and became entirely secular in character. Secondary edu- 
cation was also democratized by the founding of free high 
schools for both boys and girls. The advance of democratic 
ideas in Europe has produced a similar movement there in 
favor of popular education. 

British statesmen for a long time looked with disfavor upon 
projects for public schools. Education, they thought, unfits 
the people for manual labor and nourishes revolu- p UD ij C 
tionary ideas. " If a horse knew as much as a man, schools in 
I should not like to be its rider," declared a peer 
in Parliament, when voting against an appropriation for edu- 
cational purposes. After the passage of the Second Reform 
Act, 1 which enfranchised the working classes, the government 
set up for the first time a national system of instruction. Ele- 
mentary education in Great Britain is now free, compulsory, 
and secular. Many parents, however, prefer to send their 
children to private institutions under the control of the Estab- 
lished Church. The public and private schools together have 
well-nigh abolished illiteracy. 

The French revolutionists believed with Danton that "next 
to bread, education is the first need of the people." They pre- 
pared an elaborate scheme for public schools, but p UD ii C 
never carried it into effect. Napoleon also aimed schools in 
to set up a State system of education through 
primary and grammar grades to the lycees, or high schools. 
Lack of funds and of experienced lay teachers handicapped the 
emperor's efforts, and at the close of the Napoleonic era the 
majority of French children still attended private schools con- 
ducted by the Church. France waited until the 'eighties of 
the last century before securing a truly national system of edu- 
cation. In recent decades the government has appropriated 
large sums for educational purposes, and illiteracy is to-day 
practically non-existent. 

1 See page 477. 



636 Modern Civilization 

Prussia began to reorganize elementary education along 
modern lines as early as the reign of Frederick the Great and 
carried the work further after her crushing defeat 
schools else- by Napoleon. 1 The public school movement has 
where on the mac [ e muc h progress in other Continental coun- 
tries during recent years. The percentage of il- 
literacy is still high in Italy and higher still in Spain, Portugal, 
and the Balkan states, while in Russia most of the peasants are 
too ignorant to sign their names. With such exceptions, how- 
ever, Europe now agrees with the United States that at least 
the rudiments of an education should be the birthright of every 
child, that common schools are the pillars of democracy. 

The United States has done much more than Europe in 
popularizing the higher learning. The American state univer- 
The higher sity, with its wide curriculum of both liberal and 
learning practical subjects, is another nineteenth-century 

innovation. Previous to its establishment private denomina- 
tional institutions prepared men for the ministry and a few 
other learned professions. State universities, admitting both 
men and women, are now found in all the American common- 
wealths south and west of Pennsylvania. Their work is supple- 
mented not only by private colleges and universities, but also 
by the splendid benefactions associated with the names of 
Rockefeller and Carnegie. A university education in Europe 
is still commonly restricted to people of means. There is a 
growing tendency, however, to make the higher learning more 
accessible to poor but ambitious students. 

170. Religious Development 

Few of us realize how gradually the principle of religious 
toleration has won acceptance in modern times. At first 
Religious only certain Protestant sects, such as the Lu- 
toieration therans in Germany after the Peace of Augsburg 
and the Huguenots in France after the Edict of Nantes, enjoyed 
liberty of conscience and worship. Next, the same privileges 
were granted to all Protestant sects, as in Holland, in England 

1 See page 403. 



638 Modern Civilization 

by the Toleration Act, and in the American colonies. Finally, 
toleration was extended to every one, whether Protestant or 
Roman Catholic, Christian or non-Christian. The First 
Amendment to the Constitution of the United States provides 
that Congress shall make no law prohibiting the "free exercise 
of religion." The French revolutionists in the Declaration of 
the Rights of Man also announced that no one should be dis- 
turbed on account of his religious opinions, provided he did 
not thereby trouble public order. Prussia secured religious 
toleration under Frederick the Great. It was secured in the 
rest of Germany and in Austria-Hungary and Italy only during 
the latter part of the nineteenth century. While Roman 
Catholicism is the prevailing faith in all the Latin American 
republics, freedom of worship is commonly permitted by them. 
It may be said, broadly, that throughout the Christian world 
the various countries have now abandoned the practice of com- 
pulsion in religion. 

The Church in the Middle Ages controlled, or tried to con- 
trol, the State, upon the theory that temporal as well as spiritual 
Separation authority is derived from the pope. The Refor- 

of ? e^! 11 • mation, in those countries where it succeeded, 
and State in ' ' 

the New merely substituted a number of separate national 

World churches for the one Church of Rome. To Roger 

Williams and William Penn in the seventeenth century belongs 
the honor of having established in Rhode Island and Pennsyl- 
vania, respectively, the first political communities where re- 
ligious matters were taken entirely out of the hands of the civil 
government. The ideas of Williams and Penn found expres- 
sion in the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States. Congress is forbidden to make any law "respecting 
an establishment of religion." This means that the federal 
government cannot appropriate money for the support of 
any church. No such restriction binds the several states, 
but most of their constitutions repeat the federal prohibition. 
Church and State are absolutely separate in Canada, as well 
as in Mexico, Brazil, and some of the smaller Latin American 
countries. 



Religious Development 639 

The separation of Church and State prevails in Australia, 
South Africa, and other parts of the British Empire. The 
Liberal Party under Gladstone disestablished the 
Anglican Church in Ireland and under Lloyd ushmentin 
George disestablished it in Wales. The French $J r jJ d 
revolutionists separated Church and State, but 
Napoleon's Concordat with the pope again made Roman 
Catholicism the official religion. The Concordat was abrogated 
as recently as 1905, and both Catholic and Protestant bodies 
in France now depend entirely upon voluntary contributions 
for support. The Portuguese revolutionists, when founding 
a republic in 1910, disestablished the Roman Church, and the 
Russian revolutionists in 191 7 disestablished the Greek (Ortho- 
dox) Church. The new constitution of republican Germany 
practically disestablishes the Prussian Protestant Church, whose 
head was the kaiser. This action has considerable significance, 
for before the German Revolution the Protestant Church in 
Prussia formed a leading prop of divine-right monarchy ; altar 
and throne justified and blessed each other. The constitutions 
of Czecho-Slovakia and Poland also provide for the separation 
of Church and State. 

The liberal movement in religion has carried further that 
multiplication of sects which began with the Reformation. 1 
Baptists, Quakers, and Methodists arose in Great g 
Britain during the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- 
turies. 2 Other sects, including the Adventists, Universalists, 
and Disciples of Christ, and even new religions, such as Mor- 
monism, Spiritualism, and Christian Science, have originated 
in the United States. 

Both Freemasonry and Oddfellowship took their present 
form in Great Britain about two centuries ago. They now 
have thousands of lodges and several millions of Secret 
members throughout the world. Their insistence societies 
upon religious toleration makes it possible for them to admit 
votaries of even non-Christian faiths, as in India. 

Considerably over a third of the earth's peoples are Chris- 

1 See page 264. 2 See page 352. 



640 Modern Civilization 

tians. The adherents of Roman Catholicism number perhaps 
275,000,000; those of the Protestant denominations, perhaps 
The world 175,000,000; and those of the Greek Church, 
religions perhaps 125,000,000. The Jews are estimated 

at 15,000,000. For the other world religions the following 
figures must be considered merely rough approximations : 
Moslems, 225,000,000; Brahmanists (in India), 225,000,000; 
Buddhists (China, Japan, Tibet, Mongolia, Indo-China), 
450,000,000. In this estimate the entire populations of China 
and Japan are counted as Buddhists, owing to the difficulty of 
separating Buddhism in those countries from the national 
faiths. 

The conversion of the non-Christian world, including per- 
haps 150,000,000 heathen in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and 
„. . America, is the stupendous task to which Chris- 

Missions 

tian peoples have addressed themselves since the 
Middle Ages. The work of Roman Catholic missionaries in 
christianizing most of the Filipinos and the Indians of Latin 
America and Canada was largely accomplished in the sixteenth 
and seventeenth centuries. Several Protestant denomina- 
tions founded missionary societies in the eighteenth century, 
and by the middle of the nineteenth century almost every 
branch of Protestantism, both in Europe and America, had 
representatives throughout the non-Christian world. The 
number of Christians attached to missions is reckoned at 
10,000,000, about equally divided between Catholic and Prot- 
estant converts. 

But the results of Christian missions cannot be expressed 
statistically. Missionaries have been well called the advance- 
Missions guard of modern civilization. They establish 
and schools and colleges, build hospitals, introduce 

civuzation scientific medicine and sanitation, familiarize the 
natives with inventions and discoveries, and often succeed in 
stamping out such debasing practices as cannibalism and human 
sacrifice. Native converts become, in turn, the means of ex- 
tending the benefits of modern civilization among their country- 1 
men. The effect of missionary enterprise is therefore enor- 



Science 641 

mous, even when conversions are relatively few. We may 
safely include Christian missions among the most important 
of all agencies for bringing backward peoples into the common 
brotherhood of mankind. 

171. Science 

A hundred years ago, science enjoyed only a limited recog- 
nition in universities and none at all in secondary and ele- 
mentary schools. The marvelous achievements Science in 
of scientific men fixed public attention on their modernllfe 
work, and courses in science began to displace the older 
"classical" studies. At the same time science has become 
an international force which recognizes no national bound- 
aries, no distinctions of race or religion. Scientists in every 
land follow one another's researches ; they carry on their labor 
in common. 

Many pages would be needed merely to enumerate the 
scientific discoveries of our age. The astronomer found a new 
planet, Neptune ; x measured the distances of the Pure 
fixed stars ; and began the enormous task of photo- science 
graphing the heavens and cataloguing the five hundred to one 
thousand billion suns which form our universe. The physicist 
determined the velocity of light and showed that light, radiant 
heat, electricity, and magnetism are due to waves or undula- 
tions of the ether ; are, in fact, interconvertible forms of cosmic 
energy. The chemist proved that matter exists in a solid, 
liquid, or gaseous state according to the degree of heat to which 
it is subjected; that it is composed of one or more of eighty- 
odd elements ; and that these elements combine with one 
another in fixed proportions by weight, as when one pound of 
hydrogen unites with eight pounds of oxgyen to form nine 
pounds of water. The biologist discovered that all plants 
and animals, from the lowest to the highest, are made up of 
cells containing the transparent jelly or protoplasm which is 
the basis of life. 

' Uranus had been discovered in the eighteenth century. See page 356. 



642 



Modern Civilization 



formitarian 
theory 



New conceptions of the earth were set forth by Sir Charles 
Lyell in his Principles of Geology (1830-1833). He explained 
The uni- the changes which have produced mountains, 

valleys, plains, lakes, sea-coasts, and other natural 
features, not as the result of convulsions or catas- 
trophes, as had been previously supposed, but as due to erosion 

by water, the action of frost 
and snow, and other forces 
working gradually over im- 
mense periods of time. The 
acceptance of LyelPs uni- 
formitarian theory, coupled 
with the discovery of fossils 
in the rocks, made it neces- 
sary to reckon the age of 
the earth by untold millions, 
instead of a few thousands, 
of years. The further dis- 
covery in western Europe 
of rude stone implements 
and human bones associated 
with the remains of extinct 
animals, such as the mam- 
moth, woolly rhinoceros, and cave bear, indicated the exist- 
ence of man himself at a remote period. 

Even before Charles Darwin published the Origin of Species 
(1859), naturalists argued that existing plants and animals, 
The evo- instead of being separately created, had evolved 
lutionary from a few ancestral types. Darwin was first to 

show how evolution might have occurred by means 
of "natural selection." He pointed out that many more in- 
dividuals of each species are born than can possibly live to 
rear their offspring; that, in consequence, there is a constant 
"struggle for existence" between them; and that the fittest 
who survive are the strongest, the swiftest, the most cunning, 
the most adaptable, — in other words, those who possess char- 
acteristics that give them a superiority over their competitors. 




Sir Charles Lyell 

After a painting by T. H. Maguire. 



Science 643 

Such characteristics, transmitted by heredity, tend to become 
more and more marked in succeeding generations, until at 
length entirely new species arise. Investigators since Darwin 
have made important additions to the evolutionary theory, 
especially the Dutch naturalist Hugo de Vries, who assumes 
that new species are produced from existing forms by sudden 
leaps, instead of by the slow accumulation of slight , successive 
variations. Evolution is now a scientific commonplace, like 
gravitation, but we have still much to learn about the origin 
and development of life on the earth. 

The practical applications of science are innumerable. Ap- 
plied physics gave us the telegraph, telephone, electric lighting, 
and electric motive force. More recently, wireless Applied 
telegraphy and telephony have developed from the physics and 
discovery of the "Hertzian waves," or electro-mag- 
netic vibrations in the other. In 1895 the German Rontgen 
discovered the X-rays, and three years later the French pro- 
fessor Curie, assisted by his Polish wife, obtained from the 
mineral called pitchblende the mysterious radium. It is a 
more intense producer of the X-rays than any other substance, 
yet wastes away with incredible slowness. Physicists have 
now found many other radioactive bodies and have proved that 
radioactivity is due to the breaking-up of atoms, which are not 
the indivisible entities they were once supposed to be. This 
revelation of vast atomic energy leads to the belief that, long 
before our supplies of coal and oil are exhausted, a source of 
unlimited power may be found in the disintegration of the 
atom. Applied chemistry gave us illuminating gas, friction 
matches, such powerful explosives as dynamite and nitroglyc- 
erine, which are produced from animal or vegetable fats, arti- 
ficial fertilizers, beet sugar, aluminium, and various derivatives 
of coal tar, including the aniline dyes, carbolic acid, naphtha, 
and saccharine. The chemist now creates in his laboratory 
many organic substances which had previously been produced 
only by plants or in the bodies of animals. 

The practical applications of biology are seen in the germ 
theory of disease. The researches of the Frenchman, Louis 



644 Modern Civilization 

Pasteur, upon vegetable microorganisms (bacteria) proved 
that the harmful kinds are responsible for definite diseases in 
Medicine both plants and animals. Dr. Robert Koch of 
and surgery Berlin soon isolated the germs which produce 
tuberculosis and cholera, and during recent years those pro- 
ducing diphtheria, typhoid fever, influenza, pneumonia, lock- 
jaw, bubonic plague, and other dread scourges have been identi- 
fied. In some cases remedies called antitoxins are now admin- 
istered to counteract the bacterial toxins or poisons. Another 
step in medicine is the discovery that certain diseases are 
spread in some one particular way. The bite of one species 
of mosquito causes malaria and that of another yellow fever; 
lice transmit typhus; the tsetse-fly carries the sleeping sick- 
ness; and fleas on rats convey the bubonic plague to man. 
All this new knowledge enables us to look forward with con- 
fidence to a time when contagious and infectious diseases will 
be eliminated from civilized countries. Meanwhile, surgery 
has been revolutionized by the use of anaesthetics and the in- 
troduction of antisepsis and asepsis. 

The wonderful progress of modern science has been largely 
due to the improvement of apparatus. The giant telescope 
Scientific enables the astronomer to measure the movements 

apparatus f s t ars so incredibly remote that their light rays, 
which we now see, started earthwards before the dawn of the 
Christian era. The spectroscope analyzes the constituents 
of the most distant heavenly bodies and proves that they are 
composed of the same kinds of matter as our planet. The com- 
pound microscope reveals the existence of a hitherto unsuspected 
realm of minute life in earth and air and water. The scientific 
possibilities of the photographic camera, especially in the form 
of moving pictures, have only recently been revealed. Science 
now depends on the use of precise instruments of research as 
much as industry depends on machinery. 

172. Literature 
Since the beginning of modern times man has become more 
and more interested in himself ; he has resolved to learn what 



Literature 645 

he is, whence he came, and what he shall be. These are the 
old questions of philosophy. Perhaps no other great thinker 
has more influenced his age than Immanuel Kant _.., 

, , Philosophy 

(1724-1804). During a long and quiet life of 
lecturing and writing at the Prussian university of Konigs- 
berg, Kant produced epoch-making works in almost every 
field of philosophy, as well as in theology and natural science. 
He found the real basis of faith in God, free-will, and immortality 
in ma'n's moral nature. A later and also very influential 
philosopher was Herbert Spencer (1820- 1903). The close friend 
of Darwin, Spencer sought to build up a philosophic system 
upon evolutionary principles. The ten volumes of his Synthetic 
Philosophy form an ambitious attempt to explain the develop- 
ment of the universe as a whole, from the atom to the star, 
from the one-celled organism to man. Spencer was a pioneer 
in the study of psychology, that branch of philosophy dealing 
with the mental processes of both man and the lower animals. 

Spencer also broke fresh ground in the study of sociology. 
He carried over the principle of evolution into human society, 
with the purpose of showing how languages, laws, . 
religions, customs, and all other institutions 
naturally arise and develop among mankind. "Sociology," as 
the name for this new subject, had been previously introduced 
by the French philosopher, Auguste Comte. 

The study of history has been transformed under the in- 
fluence of the sociologists. It is no longer merely a narrative 
in chronological order of political and military History and 
events, but rather an account of the entire culture anthr °P ol °gy 
of a people. Some historical students do not limit inquiry 
to civilized man, but also investigate the culture of savage and 
barbarous peoples, as found to-day, or once found in remote 
s,ges. History, so considered, is closely related to anthropology, 
one of the most fascinating of the newer branches of learning. 

Public schools, public libraries, and cheap books, magazines, 
and newspapers have multiplied readers. Literature, in con- 
sequence, is now a profession, and the successful novelist or 
poet may secure a world-wide audience. Sir Walter Scott did 



6 4 6 



Modern Civilization 



Fiction 



much to give the novel popularity through his historical tales. 
Dickens, Thackeray, and other English writers made it a presen- 
tation of contemporary life. On the Continent al- 
most all the celebrated authors of the past century 
have been novelists. It is sufficient to mention three only, 

whose fame has gone 
out into many lands : 
the Frenchman Victor 
Hugo; the Russian 
Tolstoy; and the Pole 
Sienkiewicz. 

The drama rivals the 
novel in popularity 
„ among all 

Poetry & 

classes. It 
presents either a pic- 
ture of bygone ages or 
scenes from everyday 
life. In no country does 
it assume more impor- 
tance than in France, 
where the theater is 
considered a branch 
of public instruction. 
Much dramatic poetry, 
however, is written to 
be read, rather than for acting on the stage, for instance, the 
Faust of Goethe. Lyric poetry has been produced in all 
countries, notably in Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and 
the United States, and has become the favorite style of poetic 

expression. 

173. Music and the Fine Arts 

Music now takes almost as large a place as literature in 
modern life. Even more than literature, it ranks as an inter- 
Music in national force, for the musician, whatever his 
modem life nationality, uses a language which needs no trans- 
lation to be intelligible. 




'~^/%^2%i 



Victor Hugo 

After a painting by Leon Bonnat. 



Music and the Fine Arts 



647 



secular 
music 




Mozart's Spinet 

Stadt Museum, Vienna 

The spinet had only one string to a note, plucked 

by means of a quill or a plectrum of leather. 



During medieval times music was chiefly used in the services 
of the Church. The Renaissance began to secularize music, so 
that it might Sacred and 
express all hu- 
man joy, sad- 
ness, passion, and aspira- 
tion. The secular art thus 
includes operas, chamber 
music (for rendition in a 
small apartment instead of 
in a theater or concert hall), 
compositions for soloists, 
and orchestral symphonies. 
The Middle Ages knew 
the pipe-organ, harp, flute, 
drum, trumpet, and many 
other instruments. These were often played together, but 
with no other purpose than to increase the volume The 
of sound. There was not the slightest idea of orchestra 

orchestration. After the Ren- 
aissance new instruments 
began to appear, including 
the violin, viols of all sizes, 
the slide trombone, and the 
clarinet. Percussion action, 
applied to the old-fashioned 
spinet and harpsichord, pro- 
duced in the eighteenth cen- 
tury the pianoforte. The sym- 
phony, a tone poem combining 
all musical sounds into a har- 
monious whole, now began to 
assume its present form. The 
great symphonists — Haydn, 
Mozart, that supreme genius 
Beethoven, and their successors in the nineteenth century — thus 
created a new art to enrich the higher life of mankind. 




Ludwig van Beethoven 

After a painting by A. Kloeber, 1817. 



648 Modern Civilization 

Another master of music, Richard Wagner, created the 
musical drama, which unites music, poetry, and acting. Wagner 
The musical believed that the singer should also be an actor 
drama an( j sho^d adapt both song and gesture to the 

orchestra. He also gave much attention to the scenery and 
stagesetting, in order to heighten the dramatic effect. Wagner's 
most famous work, The Ring of the Nibelung, consists of four 
complete dramas based on old Teutonic legend. 

A new source of music has been opened up in the melodies 

of the European peasantry — their folk songs. Almost every 

_ „ country in Europe is rich in these musical wild 

Folk songs J r iii-i 

flowers, and they are now being gathered by trained 

collectors. Lullabies, marriage ditties, funeral dirges, and 

ballads are some of the varieties of folk songs. 

Like music, sculpture illustrates the internationalism of art. 

The three greatest sculptors of the nineteenth century were 

„ , ± Canova, an Italian, Thorwaldsen, a Dane, and 

Sculpture ' ' ' ' 

Rodin, a Frenchman. The first two found in- 
spiration mainly in classic statuary, which seeks ideal beauty 
of form ; the third expressed in marble the utmost realism and 
naturalism. Much fine work has also been done in bronze, 
for instance, the Chicago statue of Abraham Lincoln by St. 
Gaudens, who is rightly considered the most eminent sculptor 
produced by America. 

No century has witnessed more activity in the construction 
of churches, town halls, court houses, theaters, schools, and 
. ■ other public edifices than the nineteenth, but 

A.rciiit6ctur€ j- ' 

these have usually been reproductions of earlier 
buildings. Architects either went to Greece and Rome for 
models or imitated the Romanesque and Gothic styles. The 
extensive use of structural steel has now begun to produce an 
entirely new architectural style, more appropriate to modern 
needs, in the "skyscraper" of American cities. It is sometimes 
criticized as being "not architecture, but engineering with a stone 
veneer." The criticism seems hardly just in all cases. Such a 
structure as the Woolworth Building in New York has a beauty 
of its own and truly expresses the spirit of our industrial age. 



Music and the Fine Arts 649 

Modern painters, no longer restricted to religious pictures, 
often choose their subjects from history or contemporary life. 
They excel in portraiture, and their landscape . 
paintings unquestionably surpass the best which 
even the "old masters" of the Renaissance could produce. 
Painting flourishes especially in France, where the leading 
artists receive their training and exhibit their pictures at an 
annual exposition, the Salon at Paris. 

Studies 

1. What is the "international mind"? The "international conscience"? 
2. Look up in an encyclopedia accounts of the Rhodes Scholarships and the Nobel 
Prizes. 3. What arguments are often urged against capital punishment? 

4. What is the work of the Rockefeller Foundation? Of the Carnegie Institution? 

5. Name and locate ten of the great European universities. 6. Prepare an oral 
report on the kindergarten movement in Europe and America. 7. Show that re- 
ligious toleration and an established church may exist side by side. 8. What have 
been some of the services of missionaries in geographical exploration? g. Why has 
Darwin been called "the Newton of biology"? 10. Explain the germ theory of 
disease, n. Distinguish between antisepsis and asepsis. 12. How are the X-rays 
used in medicine and surgery? 13. Mention some of the most famous novels by 
Dickens, Scott, and Thackeray. 14. Have you read any novels by Victor Hugo, 
Tolstoy, or Sienkiewicz? 15. Name six great lyric poets of Great Britain during 
the nineteenth century. Can you name any of France, Germany, and Italy? 
16. Mention some of the great composers of the nineteenth century. 17. "Civil- 
ization, which once was fluvial — as on the Nile, the Euphrates, the Ganges, 
the Hoang-ho ; then maritime — as on the Persian Gulf, the ^Egean, the 
Mediterranean, the Yellow Sea ; then oceanic — as was possible after Columbus 
and Magellan; has lately become planetary." Comment on this statement. 



CHAPTER XIX 
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, 1871-1914 1 

174. The Triple Alliance 

Modern civilization, which on the one side creates an inter- 
national current drawing the world's peoples together in art, 
National literature, science, and industry, on the other side 

rivalries and creates a national current tending to keep them 
apart. Internationalism or cosmopolitanism lays 
stress on our common humanity, on the brotherhood of man. 
Nationalism or patriotism emphasizes love of country and devo- 
tion to the "fatherland." National rivalries and antipathies 
were never stronger than in the nineteenth century, and in the 
twentieth century they brought forth the calamitous World War. 
The national movement in Europe, we have learned, arose 
during the revolutionary and Napoleonic era, helped to pro- 
duce the popular revolts between 1815 and 1830, 
Germany on and assumed special importance between 1848 and 
the Con- 1 87 1, when both Italy and Germany won by the 

sword their long-desired unification. The creation 
of a united Italy, and especially of a united Germany, quite 
upset the delicate equilibrium of European politics as estab- 
lished at the Congress of Vienna. The old balance of power 
disappeared, for the German Empire, from the hour of its birth, 
took the first place on the Continent. 

Bismarck's former policy of "blood and iron" had resulted 
in the wars with Denmark, Austria, and France. Now that 
Franco- Germany was "satiated," as he declared, he be- 

German came a man of peace. His policy, henceforth, 

hinged upon France. The catastrophe of the 
Franco-German War seemed to remove that country from the 

1 Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 28, "Peace Circular of Nicholas II, 
1898"; No. 29, "Final Act of the First Hague Peace Conference, 1899." 

650 



The Triple Alliance 651 

ranks of the great powers, but she recovered rapidly under a 
republican government and soon paid off the indemnity im- 
posed upon her by the Treaty of Frankfort. But France was 
not reconciled to the loss of Alsace and Lorraine. 1 The annexa- 
tion of these two provinces kept alive the spirit of revenge 
in France and made her Germany's irreconcilable enemy. 
The French in 1870-1871 had fought alone; should they 
secure the support of Austria-Hungary, Italy, or Russia, the 
issue of a second Franco-German War might be quite unlike 
that of the first. Accordingly, Bismarck did all he could to 
keep France friendless among the nations. 

The "Iron Chancellor" turned first to Austria-Hungary. He 
had prepared the way for good relations by his moderation in 
arranging terms of peace with Francis Joseph I 
at the close of the "Seven Weeks' War." 2 After and 
187 1 the Hapsburgs began to seek compensation Austna- 
in the Balkans for the territory which they had lost 
in Germany and Italy. Bismarck supported their pretensions at 
the Congress of Berlin. Here the "honest broker," as he called 
himself, successfully opposed the extension of Russian influence 
in the Balkan Peninsula and agreed to an Austrian occupation 
of the Turkish provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. 3 In 1879 
Germany and Austria-Hungary made a secret alliance binding 
themselves to aid each other if either should be attacked by 
Russia or by another power which had the help of Russia. 

Bismarck scored a further triumph in 1882, when he induced 
Italy to throw in her lot with Germany and Austria-Hungary, 
thus forming the Triple Alliance. Italy took this Germany 
action, partly to secure good friends on the Conti- and Italy 
nent, but chiefly because of resentment against France, which 
had just established a protectorate over Tunis, a region marked 
for Italian colonization. Rumania also joined the group of 
Central Powers in 1883. The Triple Alliance continued un- 
broken until Italy declared war against Austria-Hungary. Ru- 
mania likewise repudiated it, upon entering the World War. 

Bismarck also did his best to convince Russia of Germany's 

1 See page 466. 2 See page 463. 3 See page 536. 



652 



International Relations 




" Dropping the Pilot " 

A cartoon by Sir John Tenniel which 
appeared in the English journal Punch 
for March 9, 1890. 



good will. During the 'eighties 
the two countries actually bound 
Germany themselves to benevo- 
and Russia j ent neu t ra lity in case 
one or the other should be assailed. 
This "reinsurance compact" was 
secretly signed in 1884 and was 
renewed three years later. But 
William II, who forced Bismarck's 
retirement in 1890, 1 did not con- 
tinue the friendly understanding 
with Russia. The kaiser seems to 
have believed that the Triple Alli- 
ance sufficiently guaranteed the 
security of Germany and that the 
"reinsurance compact" would in- 
terfere with Germany's obligations 
to Austria-Hungary, whose rivalry 
with Russia in the Balkans had 
now become more acute than ever. 



Russian 
relations 



175. The Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente 

The creation of the Triple Alliance was a challenge to France 
and Russia to form an opposing alliance. Bismarck's diplomatic 
Franco- skill had postponed it as long as he remained 

chancellor, but even before 1890 the two countries 
had begun to draw together. An alliance between 
them seemed very improbable, in view of the fact that they 
had fought each other bitterly in the Napoleonic and Crimean 
wars and of the further fact that one was a revolutionary 
republic and the other a reactionary autocracy. International 
politics sometimes makes strange bedfellows, however. ' Feelings 
of both revenge and fear stirred France: revenge for the hu- 
miliating defeats of 1870-1871 and the loss of Alsace-Lorraine; 
fear lest with the rapid increase of German wealth, population, 



1 See page 519. 



The Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente 653 

and military power she might be suddenly attacked and over- 
whelmed by her Teutonic neighbor. Under Bismarck, Germany 
had pursued a peaceful policy ; what would be her policy under 
the kaiser no one could say. In any case, mighty Russia 
seemed a most desirable ally. Russia, on her part, now realized 
more keenly the conflict between her interests in the Balkans 
and the interests of Germany's ally, Austria-Hungary ; she held 
Germany responsible for her failure at the Congress of Berlin ; 
and she, too, felt alarm at the growing preponderance of Ger- 
many in European affairs. The time was obviously ripe for a 
Franco-Russian understanding. 

Close relations between France and Russia began in the 
financial sphere, when the tsar's government, in order to build 
the Trans-Siberian Railway and develop Russian The Dual 
industries, sold large blocks of securities to French Alliance, 
investors. A secret treaty between the two 
countries was concluded in 1891 and was publicly announced 
four years later. The precise terms of the treaty are unknown. 
Apparently, France and Russia agreed that in case either 
nation was attacked the other nation would come to its as- 
sistance, and that peace should be made in concert. The Dual 
Alliance, like the Triple Alliance, thus appears to have been a 
defensive undertaking on the part of the powers concerned. 
France no longer stood alone, and Germany on her eastern 
flank had a potential enemy. It was the "nightmare coalition" 
so feared by Bismarck. 

Ever since the Crimean War Great Britain had kept aloof 
from Continental entanglements. She was no friend either of 
France or Russia, for the colonial aspirations of i so i a ti n 
these powers, the one in Africa and the other in of Great 
Asia, clashed with her own. Lord Salisbury, 1 
Disraeli's successor as leader of the Conservative Party during 
the last two decades of the nineteenth century, continued 
the traditional Francophobe and Russophobe policies of Great 
Britain. 

Toward Germany and the other members of the Triple 

1 Prime minister, 1885-1886, 1886-1892, and 1895-1902. 



654 International Relations 

Alliance the British attitude was most amicable throughout 
the period of Bismarck's chancellorship. To avoid giving 
Anglo- offense to Great Britain Bismarck scrupulously 

German observed Belgian neutrality during the war of 1870- 

187 1, and for the same reason he long opposed 
the acquisition of colonies by Germany. The supposed kin- 
ship of Germans and Anglo-Saxons and the close connections 
of the German and British courts (William II was a grandson 
of Queen Victoria) also made for good relations between the 
two countries. Nevertheless, as the 'nineties advanced, Great 
Britain and Germany began to draw apart. One reason was 
the amazing industrial development of Germany, which by 
this time had made her a serious competitor of Great Britain 
in foreign markets. ' Another reason was the aggressive colonial 
policy of Germany and her apparent intention of founding a 
world empire rivaling that of Great Britain. But the most 
important reason was Germany's declared purpose to build 
up a great navy as well as a great army. To the average 
Britisher the new German navy seemed a dagger pointed at his 
country's heart. The sympathetic attitude of the kaiser and 
his associates towards the Boers, both before and during the 
South African War, further disturbed the serenity of Anglo- 
German relations. 

The early years of the twentieth century saw Great Britain 
emerge from her isolation, which some described as "splendid" 

but others as "dangerous," and seek new friend- 
The „ . 

entente ships on the Continent. The first step was recon- 

cordiale, ciliation with France. The two nations found it 

1904 

possible to adjust their conflicting claims in Africa 
and to arrive at a "cordial understanding" {entente cordiale). 
This was not a formal alliance ; it did not provide for mili- 
tary measures, either of defense or of offense ; nor did it 
have special reference to Germany or any other Continental 
power. The significance of the entente cordiale lay in the 
fact that it healed the ancient feuds between the two na- 
tions and prepared the way for their closer cooperation in the 
future. 



The Dual Alliance and the Triple Entente 655 

Three years later Great Britain and Russia, who for half a 
century had jealously watched each other's expansion in Asia, 
composed their differences. The Anglo-Russian The Triple 
Convention 1 settled the troublesome questions Entente, 
relating to Persia, Afghanistan, and Tibet in a 
manner satisfactory to both powers. The entente cordiale 
thus became transformed into a Triple Entente, for Russia was 
already an ally of France. Japan, a British ally since 1902, 2 
also reached an understanding with Russia in regard to their 
respective spheres of influence in the Far East. 

The change in international relations which made Great 
Britain an actual ally of Japan and a potential ally of France 
and Russia, has been called a diplomatic revolu- The 
tion. Its significance was not lost on Germany, diplomatic 
While British statesmen believed that they were 
only preparing defensive measures against a possible German 
attack, most Germans pictured Great Britain as plotting their 
country's ruin. The rift between the two nations steadily 
widened ; by 1 914 it had become a chasm. 

Such, in outline, was the tangled skein of European diplomacy 
for nearly forty years following the Franco-German War. The 
Triple Alliance under Bismarck's guidance had Balance of 
dominated Europe without a competitor, before the P° wer 
creation of the Dual Alliance. Something like a balance of 
power then replaced the earlier primacy of Germany. The 
old coalition, however, continued to be far stronger than the 
new, until Great Britain aligned herself with France and Russia. 
Germany, resentful at what she described as the "encirclement 
policy" of her enemies, at the "iron ring" which she professed 
to see being forged around her, now bent every effort to break up 
the Triple Entente by diplomatic action and bV Military threats. 
At the same time she tried to create a " Middfe^tirbpe " which, 
with its annexes in Asia, would effectually^ icSarate Great 
Britain and France from their Russian ally. Bir Tne < s > e German 

projects raised new colonial problems and reop^eriedrrie Eastern 

^ ,- ..all bs J 

Question. 

1 See page 552. 2 See pageRjdg.a'T^ 



656 International Relations 

176. Colonial Problems 

Something has been said in a previous chapter about the 
Greater Europe which arose during the nineteenth and twentieth 
Nationalism centuries. European expansion went on most 
f nd rapidly after 1871, when one country after another 

endeavored to form an empire overseas. This new 
imperialism was especially fostered by the revival of national 
sentiment in Europe. Both Italy and Germany wished to 
obtain colonial dependencies where their people could settle 
and maintain the language, customs, and traditions of the home 
land. France sought compensation for her " Lost Provinces "by 
acquiring African possessions. Russia, Japan, and the United 
States annexed additional territories. Great Britain, the leading 
colonial power in the world for more than a century, took re- 
newed pride in her dominions and prepared to extend them as 
occasion offered. European peoples could not compete for mar- 
kets, trading-posts, spheres of influence, protectorates, and colo- 
nies in every part of the world without becoming as bitter rivals 
abroad as they were at home. Imperialism, as well as nation- 
alism, thus sowed the seeds of future conflict between them. 

A late-comer in the family of nations, Germany found that 
the best regions for colonization in the temperate zone already 
Germany's belonged to other powers. The colonies which 
" place in she acquired in Africa and Oceania did not attract 

settlers, provided no important markets, and im- 
posed a heavy burden on the imperial treasury for mainte- 
nance. If Germany was to secure "a place in the sun," 1 it 
could only be at the expense of other countries and by reliance 
upon "the good German sword." 2 William II made prepara- 
tions for the partition of China, but the uprising of the Chinese 
under the "Boser^sr' led to the abandonment of this enterprise. 
He tried to ge£ a foothold in South America by sending his 
warships to aemahd from Venezuela the payment of German 
debts, onl^ia beguiled up sharply by President Roosevelt, who 
concentrated the American fleet in the West Indies and in- 

1 The kaiser's phrase (1901). 2 The crown prince's phrase (1003). 



Colonial Problems 657 

voked the Monroe Doctrine. Not more successful was the 
kaiser's policy in Morocco. 

Morocco at the beginning of the twentieth century was a 
Moslem state inhabited by half-civilized and very unruly tribes. 
The rich natural resources of the country and its Firgt 
proximity to Algeria made it an inviting field for Moroccan 
French expansion. Germany also had some eco- 590(Ki906 
nomic interests there. William II precipitated the 
first Moroccan crisis, at a time when Russia, the ally of France, 
was involved in war with Japan. He paid a visit to the native 
ruler, openly flouted the French claims, and asserted in vigorous 
language the independence of Morocco. France could not 
afford to accept the challenge thus flung in her face and agreed 
to submit the matters in dispute to an international conference, 
which met at Algeciras, Spain, in 1906. The assembled powers 
prohibited the annexation of Morocco, but left France free to 
continue her policy of "peaceful penetration." The outcome 
of the conference thus proved disappointing to the kaiser. 

Germany soon found another occasion to test the strength 
of the Anglo-French entente. Owing to the anarchy in Morocco, 
a French army had occupied the capital (Fez), second 
The kaiser at once dispatched a warship to Agadir Moroccan 
on the Moroccan coast, as a notice to France to 
withdraw her troops. Feeling mounted high in both countries, 
and Europe for the moment seemed to be on the verge of the 
long-dreaded war. Great Britain, however, made common 
cause with France, for Agadir in German hands and converted 
into a naval base would have formed a palpable threat to 
British trade routes in the Atlantic. Germany now decided to 
yield. She agreed to the establishment of a French protectorate 
over Morocco, accepting as compensation some territory in the 
French Congo. This "Agadir incident" further embittered in- 
ternational relations. The French regarded their Congo cession 
as so much blackmail levied by Germany; the Germans 
looked upon Great Britain's support of France as an un- 
warranted interference which had inflicted upon them a diplo- 
matic defeat. 



658 



International Relations 



177. The Eastern Question 

Bismarck had treated the whole Eastern Question with 
contempt, declaring it "not worth the bones of a single 
Germany Pomeranian grenadier." Under William II, how- 
and Turkey ever, Germany managed to supplant Great Britain 
as the protector of the Ottoman Empire against Russia. The 




® Petrograd 



THE 

BERLIN TO BAGDAD 

RAILWAY 

q 100 200 300 400 50 
Scale of Miles 



kaiser twice visited the sultan, 1 a bloodthirsty despot whose 
massacres of Bulgarians and Armenians had aroused the horror 
of Christian Europe, and ostentatiously proclaimed himself 
the champion of all Moslems, the ally of Allah. 

1 Abdul Hamid II ("Abdul the Damned"), 1 876-1 909. See page 537. 



The Eastern Question 659 

Germany now began the "peaceful penetration" of Asiatic 
Turkey. The fertile regions of Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, 
sparcely settled and undeveloped, offered many The Bagdad 
opportunities for the investment of German capi- RaUwa y 
tal, markets for German goods, and homes for the superfluous 
population of Germany. Economic exploitation was to be 
followed by military and political control of the Ottoman 
Empire, with Germany in command of the Turkish armies 
and supreme throughout the wide area from the Black Sea to 
the Indian Ocean. All these dazzling possibilities were fore- 
shadowed in the scheme for a railway intended to unite Con- 
stantinople with Bagdad and the head of the Persian Gulf. 
Nearly all the line as far as Bagdad had been completed by the 
opening of the World War. German capitalists also began to 
construct a branch line running from Aleppo in Syria to Medina 
and Mecca in Arabia. It is obvious that the Bagdad Railway, 
with its connections, menaced the position of Great Britain 
in India and British control of Egypt and the Suez Canal. 

The practical annexation of Asiatic Turkey formed only a part 
of the kaiser's ambitious policy. European Turkey, the Balkan 
states, and Austria-Hungary were to unite with " Middle 
Germany into a huge combination for purposes of Eur °P e 
offense and defense. "Middle Europe" might ultimately draw 
within its embrace Holland, the Scandinavian states, and a pro- 
jected Polish kingdom to include almost the entire manufactur- 
ing area of Russia. German commerce would exploit and 
German militarism would dominate every one of these countries. 

The success of the "Middle Europe" project depended 
upon the attitude of the independent Christian states of the 
Balkans. It was essential that they should be _ 

J Germany 

amenable to German, or at least to Austro-Hun- and the 

garian, influence and that the influence of Russia Balkan 
° ' states 

should be entirely eliminated from their councils. 
Dynastic relationships seemed to make this possible. Prince 
(afterwards Tsar) Ferdinand of Bulgaria was a German ; King 
Charles of Rumania was the kaiser's kinsman; and the wife 
of the future King Constantine of Greece was the kaiser's 



660 International Relations 

sister. Even Serbia had a pro- Austrian ruler until 1903, when 
a revolution of Belgrade brought to the throne King Peter, 
who leaned toward Russia. The Balkan policy of the Central 
Powers consequently received a setback, for Serbia lay on the 
line of the railway from Berlin to Constantinople. 

Events now moved rapidly in the Balkans. Taking advan- 
tage of the Young Turk Revolution, 1 Austria-Hungary in 1908 
First Balkan proceeded to annex Bosnia and Herzegovina, 
crisis, 1908 These two provinces had been freed from the direct 
control of the Turks by Serbia and Russia, during the Russo- 
Turkish War of the 'seventies, but the Congress of Berlin 
had handed them over to Austria-Hungary to occupy and 
administer. 2 Their annexation, violating the Berlin settle- 
ment, raised a storm of protests in Serbia. The people of 
Bosnia and Herzegovina are Slavs, and Serbia expected some 
day to incorporate them and the Montenegrins in a South 
Slavic state stretching from the Danube to the Adriatic. Rus- 
sia also seethed with indignation at what she considered an 
affront to Slavic peoples by a Teutonic power. Russian 
troops now began to move toward the Austrian border. At 
this moment Germany ranged herself by the side of Austria- 
Hungary "in shining armor," as the kaiser afterwards expressed 
it, and dared Russia to attack her ally. Both France and Great 
Britain refused to join Russia in a general European war, and 
that country, not yet recovered from the struggle with Japan, 
thereupon gave way, withdrew her support from Serbia, and 
looked on in deep humiliation while the Central Powers pro- 
ceeded to reap the fruits of their diplomatic triumph. 

The First Balkan War (1912-1913) produced another inter- 
national crisis. Early in the course of the struggle the Serbians 
Second seized Durazzo, a port in the Turkish province of 

Balkan crisis, Albania, in order to gain access to the Adriatic. 
1912-1913 ^j ie Montenegrins a lso captured Scutari, another 
important Albanian town. Austria-Hungary would not consent 
to these annexations, which barred her own expansion to the 
southeast, and demanded that Durazzo and Scutari be evacu- 

1 See page 537. 2 See page 536. 



Militarism 66 1 

ated. Germany, as before, backed her ally. A general Eu- 
ropean war again seemed very near, until Serbia and Monte- 
negro yielded to the pressure put upon them by the great 
powers and gave up their conquests. The result was the forma- 
tion of a new Albanian state with a German prince as its ruler 
and under German influence. The Central Powers had won 
a second diplomatic triumph in the Balkans. 

The outcome of the Second Balkan War (1913), however, 
profoundly disappointed the Central Powers. The Treaty of 
Bukharest * left Germany's vassal, Turkey, with The Balkan 
only a footing in Europe ; it humiliated Bulgaria, situation 
the friend of Austria-Hungary; and it planted a 
hostile Serbia squarely in Macedonia, where she blocked the 
"Middle Europe" scheme. Even before the treaty had been 
signed, Austria-Hungary made ready to attack Serbia, but held 
her hand when Italy refused to cooperate, on the ground that 
the terms of the Triple Alliance required its members to aid 
each other only in the case of a defensive war. Germany also 
seems to have dissuaded Austria-Hungary from undertaking her 
perilous adventure in 1913. The hour had not yet struck to 
precipitate a European conflict. Meanwhile, the Central 
Powers feverishly hastened military preparations, and the other 
countries, seeing the war clouds on the horizon, likewise took 
steps to increase their arms and armies. 

178. Militarism 

Between 1871 and 1914 there were wars in the Balkans, in 
Asia, and in Africa. The nations of western Europe, however, 
did not draw the swoid against one another for " Armed 
more than forty years. Yet at no other period P eace " 
had there been such enormous expenditures for armaments, 
such huge standing armies, and such colossal navies. Western 
Europe enjoyed peace, but it was an "armed peace" based 
upon fear. 

The improvements in weapons in the latter part of the nine- 
teenth century made warfare a branch of applied science 

1 See page 538. 



662 



International Relations 



requiring expert technical knowledge both on the battle-field 
and in the munition factory. One needs only refer to the 
New means breech-loading rifle, machine gun, and smokeless 
powder, together with the continuous enlargement 
of cannon and the use of long-range, high-explosive 
projectiles. In death-dealing efficiency these rev means of 



of destruc 
tion 




" The Blessings of Peace " 

"Hans and Jacques (together) : ' And I hear there's more to come I'" A cartoon that 
appeared in Punch, February 26, 1913. 

destruction threw all previous inventions into the shade. Hav- 
ing created modern civilization, science seemed ready to de- 
stroy it. 

The changed methods of fighting demanded the "nation in 
arms," rather than the old-fashioned armies composed of 



Militarism 663 

volunteers and mercenaries. As early as the eighteenth cen- 
tury, European monarchs began to draft soldiers from among 
their subjects, but at first only artisans and peas- standing 
ants. During the revolutionary era France re- armies 
sorted to forced levies, allowing, however, many exemptions. 
Prussia went further during the Napoleonic era and adopted 
universal military service, as well in time of peace as in time 
of war. All able-bodied men were to receive several years' 
training in the army and then pass into the reserve, whence 
they could be called to the colors upon the outbreak of hos- 
tilities. This Prussian system, having proved its worth in the 
War of Liberation against Napoleon, 1 was extended by Wil- 
liam I soon after his accession to the throne. 2 The speedy 
triumphs of Prussia in 1866 and 1870 led all the principal 
nations, except Great Britain, to adopt universal military serv- 
ice. Europe thus became an "armed camp," with five million 
men constantly under arms. 

Great Britain found sufficient protection in her fleet, which 
it has long been the British policy to maintain at a strength at 
least equal to that of any two other powers. Her . 
widespread empire depends upon control of the 
seas, and, being no longer self-supporting, she would face starva- 
tion in time of war were she blockaded by an enemy. Germany, 
however, would not acquiesce in British maritime supremacy, 
and under the inspiration of the kaiser, who declared that the 
"trident must be in our hands," started in 1898 to build a 
mighty navy. Helgoland, 3 off the mouth of the Elbe, was 
converted into a naval base, a second Gibraltar. The Kiel 
Canal, originally completed in 1896, was reconstructed in 19 14 
to allow the passage of the largest warships between the Baltic 
and the North Sea. Great Britain watched these preparations 
with unconcealed dismay. Her answer was the complete re- 
organization of the British fleet, the scrapping of nearly two 
hundred vessels as obsolete, and the laying-down of dread- 
noughts and super-dreadnoughts. The naval rivalry threatened 

1 See page 403. 2 See page 460. 

3 Acquired by Great Britain in 1815 and ceded to Germany in 1890. 



664 



International Relations 



Peace 
rescript of 
Nicholas II, 
1898 



to become so enormously expensive that British statesmen 
twice proposed a "naval holiday," that is, an agreement to 
keep down the rate of increase. But Germany refused to enter 
into an arrangement which would have left Great Britain still 
mistress of the seas. 

The crushing burden of standing armies and navies pro- 
duced a popular agitation in many countries to abolish warfare. 
The movement took practical shape as the result 
of a proposal by Nicholas II for an international 
conference, which should arrange a general dis- 
armament. The tsar's rescript of 1898 was a 
telling indictment of militarism in these words : "The preserva- 
tion of peace has been put forward as the object of international 

policy. In its name the great 
states have concluded between 
themselves powerful alliances ; the 
better to guarantee peace, they 
have developed their military forces 
in proportions hitherto unprece- 
dented, and still continue to in- 
crease them without shrinking from 
any sacrifice. All these efforts, 
nevertheless, have not yet been 
able to bring about the beneficent 
results of the desired pacification. 
... In proportion as the arma- 
ments of each power increase, do 
they less and less fulfill the objects 
which the governments have set 
before themselves. Economic crises, due in great part to the 
system of armaments a outrance, 1 and the continual danger 
which lies in this accumulation of war material, are transform- 
ing the 'armed peace' of our days into a crushing burden 
which the peoples have more and more difficulty in bearing. 
It appears evident, then, that if this state of things continues, 
it will inevitably lead to the very cataclysm which it is desired 
1 "To the utmost." 




Nicholas II 



Pan-Germanism 665 

to avert, and the horrors of which make every thinking being 
shudder in anticipation." 

As the result of the tsar's rescript, delegates from twenty-six 
sovereign states met in 1899 at The Hague, Holland, in the 
First Peace Conference. A Second Peace Con- p ea ce 
ference of forty-four sovereign states assembled in conferences 
1907. Attempts were made at these gatherings to mitigate the 
horrors of future wars, for instance, by prohibiting the use of 
asphyxiating gases and "dumdum" bullets and the dropping 
of projectiles from balloons. Every proposal to reduce arma- 
ments encountered, however, the strenuous opposition of 
Germany. The German government would not abandon those 
deep-laid schemes for conquest, first in Europe and ultimately 
throughout the world, which are summed up in one word — 
Pan- Germanism. 

179. Pan-Germanism 

The material development of Germany between 1871 and 1914 
was perhaps unparalleled in European history. Her popula- 
tion increased from forty-one to sixty-five millions ; Kultur and 
her foreign trade more than trebled ; and she be- natlonalism 
came an industrial state second in Europe only to Great Britain. 
Proud of their army, navy, and police, of their handsome, well- 
ordered cities, of their technical schools and universities, of 
their science, literature, music, and art, the Germans came to 
believe that they enjoyed a higher culture (Kultur) than any 
other people. The Russians, by comparison, were barbarians ; 
the French and Italians decadent ; and the British and Ameri- 
cans, mere money-grabbers. "We are the salt of the earth," 
the kaiser told his countrymen. Such ideas found a fertile 
soil in the exaggerated nationalism which had been fostered by 
the creation of the German Empire. 

The ardent belief in the superiority of German Kultur seemed 
to impose the duty of extending it to alien and therefore in- 
ferior peoples. This was Germany's divine mission, Kultur and 
according to her philosophers, historians, clergy- imperialism 
men, and government officials. Even the kaiser could say in all 



666 International Relations 

seriousness that "God has called us to civilize the world; we 
are the missionaries of human progress." 

Before the world could be remade upon the German model, 
it had to be first conquered. Both backward and "decadent" 
Kultur and nations possessed their own standards of civiliza- 
miiitarism tion, which they would not willingly abandon 
even for Germany's so-called beneficent Kultur. World- 
power, in fact, meant war. Accordingly, the leaders of German 
society labored in press and school and pulpit to prove that war 
is a holy and righteous thing ; that it corresponds in the life of 
nations to the "struggle for existence" l in animal life ; and that 
by war the weaker, incompetent states are weeded out and 
room is made for those stronger, more efficient states which 
alone deserve to inherit the earth. At the same time the people 
were led to consider war inevitable because of the hostile at- 
titude of Russia, the "Slavic peril"; because France wanted 
revenge for her "Lost Provinces"; and because Great Britain 
only awaited a favorable opportunity to take the German navy 
and stifle German commerce. It was taught that Germany 
ought not to delay until her enemies were ready for a combined 
attack ; she should attack first and reap the advantage of her 
military preparedness. This idea of an offensive-defensive 
war particularly appealed to a people who owed their national 
greatness to successful conflicts deliberately incurred by un- 
scrupulous rulers. 

The autocratic nature of the German government, vesting 
the control of foreign affairs so largely with the emperor, 2 
made the egotistical, domineering personality of 
William II a very important factor in the inter- 
national situation. The kaiser inherited the warlike traditions 
of Frederick the Great and William I ; and even the shadowy 
claims to universal dominion put forth during the Middle Ages 
by the Holy Roman Emperors. His public utterances for thirty 
years were a constant glorification of war and conquest. One 
of his first speeches after mounting the throne had an ominous 
sound : " I solemnly vow always to be mindful of the fact that 

1 See page 642. 2 See page 513. 



Pan-Germanism 667 

the eyes of my ancestors are looking down upon me from the 
other world, and that one day I shall have to render to them an 
account both of the glory and the honor of the army." And on 
another occasion he said : "It is the soldiers and the army, not 
parliamentary majorities, that have welded the German Em- 
pire together. My confidence rests upon the army." 

During the earlier years of his reign the kaiser seemed to find 
sufficient outlet for his restless energy in the development of 
Germany. The task lost its novelty and interest p 

after a time, and he turned his uneasy gaze outside German 
the empire to the aggrandizement of Germany Lea s ue 
abroad. More and more he came to be in sympathy with the 
aggressive policies advocated by the German militaristic class. 
It included the army and navy officers, both active and re- 
tired ; the large landowners {Junkers) ; the merchant princes, 
bankers, and manufacturers; the university professors, dip- 
lomats, and higher government officials — all, in short, who ex- 
pected to profit from a greater and enormously more wealthy 
Germany. These men organized in 1890 the Pan-German 
League, which soon became the most powerful political or- 
ganization in the empire. 

The- Pan-Germans thought that they could conquer Europe, 
nation by nation. They expected to overwhelm France by a 
sudden blow, capture Paris, seize the former 
Franche-Comte and what remained of French German 
Lorraine, 1 together with the Channel ports, take P r °g ram 
the French colonies, and levy an indemnity large enough to 
pay the expenses of the war. Then they intended to turn 
against Russia and annex her Polish and Baltic provinces. 
Their Austrian ally, meanwhile, would overrun Serbia and open 
the German "corridor" to the Orient. Once mistress of the 
Continent, Germany might look forward confidently to the 
issue of a future struggle with Great Britain and the British 
Empire for the dominion of the world. 

Every preparation was made, every precaution was taken, 
to insure a prompt, decisive victory. By the summer of 1914, 

1 Once part of the Holy Roman Empire. See page 290. 



668 International Relations 

a special war tax, to be expended on fortifications and equip- 
ment, had been collected. The army had been much increased. 

.. ™_ ^ „ Enormous stocks of munitions had been accumu- 
The Day 

lated. The Kiel Canal had been reconstructed. 

Strategic railways leading to the Belgian, French, and Russian 

frontiers had been laid down. All things were ready for "The 

Day." Germany required only a pretext to launch the World 

War. 

Studies 

i. Explain the following: (a) entente cordiale; (b) the "Lost Provinces"; 
(c) "Middle Europe"; (d) "Agadir incident"; and (e) "reinsurance compact." 
2. "The Franco-German War of 1870-1871 was the starting point of a new era in 
European diplomacy." Comment on this statement. 3. How was Alsace-Lorraine 
the "open sore" of European politics after 1871? 4. "The history of Europe in 
recent years often has hinged upon such remote points as a railroad in Asia Minor, 
or a protectorate in northern Africa, or a harbor in China." Comment on this 
statement. 5. How would you define (a) militarism and (6) imperialism, as these 
terms have been used in the present chapter? 6. What are some of the arguments 
for and against compulsory military service? 7. "England's navy is a necessity; 
Germany's a luxury." Explain this statement. 8. Why has war been called the 
"national industry" of Prussia? 9. Point out on the map the European countries 
included in the Pan-German program. 10. On the map between pages 718-719 
trace the present Slav- German boundary in Europe. 



CHAPTER XX 
THE WORLD WAR, 1914-1918 » 

180. Beginning of the War, 1914 

The pretext was soon supplied. On June 28, 19 14, the arch- 
duke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Hapsburg throne, and his 
wife were assassinated at Sarajevo, the capital of , 
Bosnia. The murderer, a Bosnian and therefore Sarajevo 
an Austrian subject, belonged to a Serbian secret assassination 
society which aimed to separate Bosnia and Herzegovina from 
the Dual Monarchy and add them to Serbia. The Austrian 
government, after conducting an investigation, alleged that he 
had been aided by Serbian officials, with the connivance of the 
government of Serbia. This accusation has never been proved. 
No doubt exists, however, that the Sarajevo assassination 
was a political crime, the natural outcome of the propaganda 
among the South Slavs (Jugoslavs) for the expulsion of Austria 
from the Balkans as she had been expelled from Italy and 
Germany. 

Nearly a month passed. Then on July 23, Austria-Hungary 
sent a note to Serbia, harsh, peremptory, and, except in name, 
an ultimatum. It demanded that Serbia suppress ultimatum 
anti-Austrian publications and organizations, dis- to Serbia 
miss from the army or the civil service all those implicated in 
the anti-Austrian propaganda, and eliminate anti-Austrian 
teachers from the public schools. Serbia was further to allow 
the "collaboration" of Austrian officials in carrying out these 
measures. Forty-eight hours only were granted for the uncon- 
ditional acceptance or rejection of the ultimatum. 

'Webster, Readings in Medieval and Modern History, chapter xxxv, "Diplo- 
macy of the Great War." Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 31, "Wilson's 
Fourteen Points, 1918"; No. 32, "Declaration of Independence of the Czecho- 
slovak Nation, 1918." 

669 



670 The World War 

Serbia replied on July 25. She agreed to all the Austriar 
demands except those which required the presence on Serbian 
Serbia's so ^ °^ representatives of the Dual Monarchy. 

reply Such an arrangement, Serbia pointed out, would 

violate her rights as a sovereign state — would make her, in 
fact, an Austrian vassal. She concluded by offering to submit 
the entire dispute to arbitration by the international tribunal 
at The Hague or to the mediation of the great powers. Austria- 
Hungary rejected the Serbian reply as insincere and on July 28 
declared war upon her little neighbor. 

Russia, the protector of the Slavs of the Balkans, could not 

look on without concern while a great Teutonic power destroyed 

_ _ ' the independence of a weak Slav state. But if 

Ineffective ^ 

peace Russia intervened to aid Serbia, by making war 

proposals on Austria-Hungary, then Germany, as the latter's 
ally, would surely attack Russia ; and France, bound to Russia 
in firm alliance, would be obliged to attack Germany. Efforts 
to preserve the peace of Europe began at once. The Triple 
Entente first asked Austria-Hungary to extend the time limit 
for the answer from Serbia. Austria-Hungary declined to do 
so. Then Great Britain and France urged Serbia to make her 
answer to the ultimatum as conciliatory as possible. After the 
Serbian reply had. been delivered, Great Britain, through Sir 
Edward Grey, Minister for Foreign Affairs, suggested that 
the four great powers not directly involved should hold a 
conference in London to adjust the Austro- Serbian difficulty. 
France, Italy, and Russia accepted the suggestion. Germany 
rejected it. Finally, Great Britain invited Germany herself 
to propose some method of mediation, but the German govern- 
ment declared that the whole dispute concerned only Austria- 
Hungary and Serbia and that Russia should not interfere in it. 
If Russia did interfere, Germany would back her ally. 

We know now why these and other peace proposals during 
The that last fateful week of July, 1914, were ineffect- 

decision ive. Germany and Austria-Hungary had already 

decided for war. The present republican govern- 
ment of Austria published in the latter part of 1919 an official 



Beginning of the War 671 

volume 1 of documents found in the archives of the former 
imperial government, from which it appears that a ministerial 
meeting held in Vienna, July 7, 1914, took the momentous 
decision to force war on Serbia. This was to be done by send- 
ing a note with such impossible demands that the Serbian 
government would be compelled to reject them. An Aus- 
tro-Hungarian declaration of war would then follow in due 
course. The Foreign Minister, Count Berchtold, who presided 
at the meeting and afterwards signed the note to Serbia, de- 
clared to the ministers that the kaiser had "emphatically" 
assured him of the "unconditional support of Germany in case 
of a warlike complication with Serbia." Germany was thus pre- 
pared to support Austria-Hungary to the uttermost. 

Russia had yielded to the Central Powers in the Balkan 
crises of 1908 and 1912-1913 ; in 1914 she accepted their chal- 
lenge. Russian troops began to mobilize against 
Austria-Hungary on July 29 and against Germany at war with 
on July 30. The German government, which Russia 
had already begun military preparations, sent an ultimatum 
to Russia ordering that country to start demobilization within 
twelve hours or accept the consequences (July 31). Russia 
did not reply. The kaiser, exercising his right to make "defen- 
sive warfare," immediately signed the document declaring that 
a state of hostilities existed between Germany and Russia 
(August 1). 

Asked by Germany what was to be her attitude in the coming 
struggle, France replied that she "would do that which her in- 
terests dictated," and began to mobilize. Ger- _ 

' ° Germany 

many then declared war on France (August 3). at war with 

It is now known 2 that had France decided to France 

remain neutral, thus repudiating her treaty with Russia, the 

German government intended to demand the surrender of the 

fortresses of Toul and Verdun as a pledge of French neutrality 

' Diplomatic Documents on the Antecedents of the War of 1914, Part I, Vienna, 1919. 
State Printing Office. 

3 Revelations of M. Pinchon, Minister for Foreign Affairs, at the Sorbonne, 
Paris, March 1, 1918. 



672 The World War 

until the close of the war. Germany thus showed herself so 
anxious to embroil France in the conflict that she made demands 
which that country could not and was not expected to accept. 

Germany also tried to learn the attitude of Great Britain. 
The German Chancellor, Bethmann-Hollweg, promised that if 
Attitude Great Britain would stand aloof, Germany would 

of Great agree not to take any European territory from 

France, but he refused to give assurances as to 
the French colonies. Sir Edward Grey retorted that Great 
Britain could never conclude such a disgraceful bargain with 
Germany, at the expense of France. The British Foreign 
Minister, however, made it clear that Great Britain would not 
be drawn into a Franco-German War unless France and Russia 
rejected "any reasonable proposal" for peace put forward by 
the Central Powers. After the German declaration of war 
on Russia and the German invasion of neutral Luxemburg, 1 
Great Britain promised France the help of the British fleet in 
case the German fleet operated against the unprotected western 
coast of France. The British government could not honorably 
do less, for, in accordance with the Anglo-French entente, France 
since 191 2 had concentrated her fleet in the Mediterranean so 
that the British fleet might be concentrated in the North Sea 
against the possibly hostile German navy. 

The neutrality of Belgium was guaranteed by the European 
powers, including France and Prussia, both in 1831 and 1839; 
furthermore, the Second Peace Conference in 1907, with Ger- 
many consenting, expressly declared the territory of neutral 
Violation of states to be inviolable. True to its treaty engage- 
Belgian ments, the French government on August 1 an- 
nounced its intention to respect Belgian neutrality. 
The next day, however, Germany addressed a note to Belgium 
demanding permission to move troops across the country into 
France and threatening, in case of a refusal, to leave Belgium's 
fate to the "decision of arms." The Belgian government, 
under King Albert, declined to "sacrifice the honor of the 
nation and betray its duty toward Europe." On August 4 the 
1 See page 428 and note 1. 



Beginning of the War 



673 



German army invaded Belgium. Bethmann-Hollweg frankly 
admitted before the Reichstag, the same day, that the invasion 
was "a breach of international law," and the kaiser, in a cable 
message to President Wilson 1 acknowledged that Belgian neu- 
trality "had to be violated by 
Germany on strategical grounds." 

An invasion of Belgium was, in 
fact, vital to the success of the 

German plan of cam- _. 

\ , Strategic 

paign, which involved importance 

a swift, crushing blow of Bel s ium 

at the French before Russian 

mobilization could be completed. 

No rapid movement against France 

was possible from the east, first, 

because the high bluffs and narrow 

river valleys in this part of the 

country made defense easy; and, 

second, because the eastern frontier 

had been protected, since the 

Franco-German War, by fortresses 

all the way from Verdun to Belfort. An attack from the 

northeast presented fewer difficulties, for a comparatively 

level plain, well provided with roads and railways, stretches 

from Germany through Belgium and France to the environs of 

Paris. Furthermore, France had not strongly fortified her 

frontier on the side of Belgium, having trusted to the neutrality 

of that country for protection. 

The neutrality of Belgium has been a cardinal point in British 

foreign policy since the Middle Ages. To Great Britain it seems 

essential that the Belgian coast shall not be occu- Germany 

pied by a strong military power, thus menacing at war with 
tl . . / . ? v ™ J , ' it . . Great Britain 

British control of the Channel. Over this question 

she fought with Philip II of Spain in the sixteenth century and 

later with Louis XIV and Napoleon. Great Britain, moreover, 

had her explicit treaty obligations to Belgium, obligations which 

1 Sent August 10, 1914. 




King Albert I 



674 



The World War 



no honorable nation could fail to respect. When, therefore, news 
came that German troops were entering Belgium, the British 
government, at this time controlled by the Liberals under Mr. 
Asquith, sent an ultimatum to Germany, requiring assurances by 
midnight, August 4, that Belgian neutrality would be respected. 
Germany refused, and Bethmann-Hollweg, in his final interview 
with the British ambassador at Berlin, complained that Great 
Britain was about to fight a kindred nation just for "a scrap of 
paper." About midnight Great Britain declared war on 
Germany. 

181. The Western Front 



The war quickly converted the Triple Entente into a Triple 
Alliance. Great Britain, France, and Russia engaged not to 
The Allies, make peace separately and to accept a general 
peace only on terms agreeable to all of them. The 
instinct of self-preserva- 
tion, which had united 
Europe against France 
under Louis XIV and 



1914 



BEHEMBERTOUM 




Napoleon , was now aroused 
against the military domi- 
nation of Germany under 
the kaiser. As on previ- 
ous occasions, Great Brit- 
ain, with her fleet, her 
money, and eventually her 
army, formed the keystone 
of the coalition. 

Germany and Austria- 
Hungary, though less pop- 
ulous and wealthy than 
their antagonists, held a 
better geographical posi- 
tion, and at the outset 
they possessed a superiority both in the number of trained 
soldiers and in guns, munitions, and equipment. Above all, 



British Recruiting Poster 



The Western Front 675 

they were prepared. Austria- Hungary had already massed 
part of her army against Serbia, while Germany, by means of 
her strategic railroads, could move and concentrate The Central 
troops on her eastern or western frontier with p °wers, 1914 
greater speed than either Russia or France. Should it prove to 
be a short war, the Central Powers seemed likely to win an 
overwhelming victory. 

Hostilities began on the western front with the converging 
advance of the German armies in three groups, one through Bel- 
gium, one through Luxemburg, and one from Lor- 
raine against the eastern fortresses of France. German 
The Germans occupied Luxemburg without re- advance 
sistance and then threw themselves upon the Belgians. The 
fortresses of Liege and Namur, supposedly impregnable, were 
smashed to pieces by the huge German siege guns, and Brussels 
itself was captured. Nevertheless, the Belgian resistance — 
heroic, unexpected — delayed by at least twelve days the arrival 
of the Germans on the frontiers of France. The French gained 
time to complete mobilization and the British to send an ex- 
peditionary force of one hundred thousand men. After the 
first clash at Mons, the Anglo-French armies retired southward, 
fighting delaying actions all the way. The invaders soon crossed 
the Marne and at the nearest point came within fifteen miles 
of Paris. The opposing forces were now extended in an immense 
semi-circle, one hundred and fifty miles in length, from the 
vicinity of Paris to a little below Verdun. 

At the Marne the Allied commanders, General Toff re and 

Sir John French, stayed the retreat. A new army (the Sixth 

Army), which had been quietly prepared in Paris 

... . . _, . Battle of 

and of whose existence the Germans were ignorant, the Marne, 

was suddenly launched at their exposed right September 
n , a , • ^ , tT , , 6-12, 1914 

Hank. At the same time General Poors mag- 
nificent assault drove in their center on both sides of the marshes 
of St.-Gond. The weight of the combined attack sent them 
back in confusion, and with heavy losses of men and material, 
across the Aisne River. The importance of these successes was 
vastly increased by the simultaneous victories of the French on 



676 



The World War 



their eastern frontier, where they held the enemy back in the 
Argonne and before Nancy. Such was the seven days' battle 
of the Marne. The Germans had been out-generaled and out- 




Plan of the Battlf of the Marne 

British army (Field-Marshal French). 
VI. French army (Manoury). 
V. " " (Franchet d'Esperey). 

IX. " " (Foch). 

IV. " " (Langle de Cary). 

III. " " (Sarrail). 

1. German army (Von Kliftk). 

2. " " (VonBulow). 

3- " " (VonHausen). 

4- " " (Duke of Wiirtemberg). 

5. " " (Crown Prince of Prussia). 

fought ; German plans for a speedy triumph had been upset ; 
and Paris had been saved. 

Both sides now bent every effort to extend their lines north- 
ward to the sea. The Germans hoped to seize Dunkirk and 
The race Calais, two important Channel ports, and thus 

to the sea to interrupt the direct line of communication be- 
tween Great Britain and France; but the Allies reached the 
Channel first and farther north at Nieuport. Then followed 
in October and November, 1914, the first battle of Ypres, 
when the Germans, by massed attacks, tried vainly to break 
through the British lines. Near the coast the Belgians cut 
the dikes of the river Yser, flooding the lowlands and stopping 







677 



678 



The World War 



any advance in this direction. Trench warfare now began to 
replace open fighting all along the western front from the North 
Sea to the Swiss frontier, a distance of six hundred miles. 

Repeated efforts to break the deadlock on the western front 
marked the year 191 5. Both French and British made some 
The progress in clearing enemy trenches by means of 

deadlock concentrated shell-fire, but as yet the production of 

high-explosive shells was insufficient for prolonged "blasting 
operations." The Germans, on their part, employed poison- 
gas — contrary to the terms of the Hague Conventions — in 
the second battle of Ypres, during April and May. The situ- 
ation was critical for a time, until the French and British manu- 
factured gas masks to overcome the choking fumes. The Allies 
were eventually obliged themselves to use this hideous device 
against the enemy. 

The first half of 19 16 was marked by the German assault upon 

Verdun, the most important French stronghold on the eastern 

frontier. The siege of 
Siege of . . , • . 

Verdun, the city lasted nearly 

February- nve months and cost the 
lives of at least half a 
million men on both sides. The Ger- 
mans under the crown prince were 
determined to take the place at any 
cost. The French were equally de- 
termined to defend it at any cost. 
"They shall not pass !" became the 
battle-cry of all France. They did 
not pass. More than that, in the 
fall of 19 1 6 the French resumed the 
offensive and within seven hours 
drove the Germans back almost to 
their original lines. Ruined Verdun, 
like ruined Ypres, thus remained in Allied hands. 

What more than anything else relieved the pressure on 
Verdun was the Anglo-French attack against the German lines 
along the river Somme. By this time Great Britain had 




Sir Douglas Haig 



The Western Front 



679 



adopted conscription and had built up a magnificent army 
commanded by Sir Douglas Haig. The Allies now possessed 
more heavy guns and munitions than the Germans, Battle of 
and in the "tanks" a weapon destined to prove its the Somme, 
value in breaking the trench deadlock. The Allied November, 
advance took place on a front of twenty miles to 1916 
a maximum depth of about nine miles. It was finally checked 
by German counter-attacks and by bad weather, which turned 
the battle-field into a sea of mud. k i 

To forestall another attack, the Germans in the spring of 
191 7 retired on a wide front to the shorter and more defensible 
Hindenburg 
Line. Theter- Hindenburg 
ritory evacu- Line 
ated by them was laid 
completely waste, every 
building being destroyed, 
vineyards uprooted, and 
orchards cut down. The 
Allies advanced over this 
wilderness and from April 
to December conducted a 
steady offensive, which 
brought them appreciable 
gains. The Hindenburg 
Line still held, however, 
when the approach of 

winter PUt an end tO active ^ ne °^ a serles °* Powerful cartoons by Louis Rae- 

maekers, a Dutch artist. 

operations. 

The German treatment of Belgium and northern France 
aroused the horror of the civilized world. Deliberate, systematic 
massacres of the civil population to prevent or 
punish resistance, the looting and burning of entire atrodties 
villages, the destruction of Louvain with its and 
famous university, the shelling of the Cloth Hall outrages 
of Ypres and the cathedral of Reims, the imposition of excessive 
taxes and heavy fines on Belgian and French cities, the robbing 




" Kultur has Passed Here " 



68o 



The World War 



of Belgium and northern France of coal, metals, machinery, 
and raw materials, finally, the forcible deportation of tens 
of thousands of civilians, both men and women, for forced labor 
in Germany — these were some of the atrocities and outrages 
which characterized German treatment of the conquered terri- 
tory. The inhabitants would have perished had it not been for 
the efficient system of relief Organized by an American, Mr. 
Herbert C. Hoover, who enlisted the help of the Allies and of 
the United States in providing food, clothing, and other neces- 
saries of life for the invaded districts. 



182. The Eastern Front 

There was no deadlock on the eastern front. The Russians 
mobilized more rapidly than had been expected and put large 
forces in the field, under the general command 
in East °f the g ran( l duke Nicholas, an uncle of the tsar. 

Prussia, Their plan of campaign involved a simultaneous 

advance against the Germans in East Prussia and 
the Austrians in Galicia. The Russian armies which entered 

East Prussia, a difficult country 
of lakes, marshes, and rivers, 
were surprised and well-nigh an- 
nihilated by Hindenburg at the 
battle of Tannenberg (August, 
1 9 14). The following January, 
when the Russians again ven- 
tured into this part of Germany, 
Hindenburg won another over- 
> whelming victory at the battle of 
the Mazurian Lakes. 
The Russians met better luck in 

„„_ „ . Galicia. They over- 

The Russians 

in Galicia, ran all this Austrian 

1914-1915 province and by the 
spring of 191 5 began to penetrate the Carpathian passes into 
Hungary. These successes had the further result of causing 
the withdrawal of German troops from the western front, 




-\T- 
Hindenburg 



The Eastern Front 



681 




j Central Powers 

| Farthest Russian advance, 19H-1915 

Russian advance, 1916 (Brusilov's drive) 

Battle line, March 1918 (signing of Brest-Litovsk TreloyT 



The Eastern Front 



682 The World War 

with a consequent weakening of Germany's offensive power 
against the French and British. 

The summer of 19 15 saw some of the most tremendous en- 
gagements of the entire war. Hindenburg now assumed com- 
Hindenburg's man d of the eastern armies of both the Central 

"drive," Powers and started a terrific "drive" in Poland 

1915 

and Galicia. The result of the fighting is best 

traced on the accompanying map, which shows the enormous 
territory reoccupied or newly acquired by the Central Powers. 
At the end of 191 5 the battle-line on the eastern front stretched 
from the Gulf of Riga to the Rumanian frontier. 

Russia's recuperative power was strikingly exhibited the fol- 
lowing year. General Brusilov attacked the Austro-German 
., , armies on a wide front between the Pripet Marshes 

Brusilov s . 1 1 r 

" drive," and Bukowma, pushing them back from twenty to 

1916 fifty miles and making huge captures of men and 

supplies. The outbreak of the Russian Revolution, early in 
191 7, made it impossible to continue the offensive. From this 
time there was little more fighting on the eastern front. Never- 
theless, Russia's part in the World War should not be mini- 
mized. The sacrifices which she made without stint during 
the first three years of the struggle were essential to the ulti- 
mate victory of the Allies. 

183. The Balkan and Italian Fronts 

As soon as the war broke out, Montenegro made common 

cause with Serbia. The three other Christian states of the 

Balkans at first did not declare themselves. Bul- 
Neutrahty ' . , 

of the garia had no love for Austria-Hungary, but she 

Balkans cordially hated Serbia, her most successful foe in 

the Second Balkan War. Rumania was friendly neither to 

Austria-Hungary nor to Russia, for both possessed provinces 

which she wished to "redeem" from alien rule. 1 Public opinion 

in Greece, as voiced by Venizelos, the prime minister, favored 

the Allies. The pro-German King Constantine and the court 

party managed, nevertheless, to preserve a nominal neutrality. 

1 Transylvania, Bukowina, and Bessarabia. 



The Balkan and Italian Fronts 



683 




Turkey, largely controlled by Germany and fearful of Rus- 
sia's designs on Constantinople, soon espoused the cause of the 
Central Powers. Her entrance Turkey joins 

did not at first appreciably the Central 

Powers 
affect the situation, for she was October, 

still cut off from her associates 1914 
by a neutral Bulgaria and a hostile Serbia. 
The sultan proclaimed a holy war of ex- 
termination against the "enemies of Islam." 
Contrary to German hopes, the Moslems 
of North Africa, Egypt, and India, instead 
of revolting, loyally supported France and 
Great Britain. An attempt in 191 5 by an VlCT0RIA Cross 
Anglo-French fleet to force the Dardanelles Established in 1856 for 
and take Constantinople proved disastrous, acts of bravery in battle. 

, t. T . , , , . It is a bronze Maltese 

however. No greater success attended the cross with the royal crest 
heroic efforts of the "Anzacs" (Australians (lion and crown ) ^ the 

, __ _ , 1 N . center and below it a 

and New Zealanders) to secure a footing on scroll i nscr ;b e d "For 

the peninsula of Gallipoli, and the troops Valour." 

were finally withdrawn from this graveyard of Allied hopes. 

After long hesitation Bulgaria also threw in her lot with the 
Central Powers. The situation in the Balkans now changed 
overnight. Brave little Serbia, Bul „ aria 
who earlier in the war had joins the 
twice expelled the Austrians, po"^ rs 
quickly collapsed under the October, 
double attack of Austro-Ger- 
mans from the north and Bulgarians from 
the east. Montenegro, Serbia's ally, was 
likewise conquered, together with northern 
Albania. The triumph of the Central 
Powers had the important result of opening 
up railway communication between Berlin 
and Constantinople. 

Military operations in the Balkans were 
not yet over. Influenced by the success of Brusilov's "drive" 
on the eastern front and the Anglo-French victories at Verdun 




The Iron Cross 



68 4 



The World War 



Allies, 

August, 

1916 



and on the Somme in the West, Rumania decided to join the 
Allies, in order to liberate her "unredeemed" peoples from 
Rumania anen ru ^ e - Her arrrnes promptly invaded Tran- 
joins the sylvania. A German-Austrian-Bulgarian counter- 

stroke drove them out and led to the speedy 
conquest of two-thirds of their own territory. 
The Rumanian collapse brought enormous advantages to the 
Central Powers, who now had access to the grain fields and 
oil wells of Rumania. It also shortened their battle-front by 
five hundred miles and facilitated their communications with 
Bulgaria and Turkey. 

After the failure of the Dardanelles campaign a large Anglo- 
French force had been gathered behind the defenses of Salonika 
in Greece, partly as a threat to Turkey and Bulgaria 

vJiCCCC joins 

the Allies, and partly to prevent King Constantme from bnng- 
June, 1917 j n g Q reece m t the war on the side of the Central 
Powers. He was finally deposed by the Allies, who placed 

his second son, Alexander, 
on the throne. Venizelos, 
whom Constantine had dis- 
missed from office, became 
prime minister once more 
and immediately took steps 
to insure the cooperation of 
his country with the Allies. 
The Balkan front henceforth 
extended westward from the 
iEgean to the Adriatic. 

Italy declared neutrality 
in 1 9 14, giving the same 
reason which she had given 
in 1913, 1 namely, that the 
terms of the Triple Alliance 
did not bind her to assist the Central Powers in an offensive 
war. But Italy was unable to remain neutral. Union with 
the Allies meant an opportunity to wrest Italia Irredenta 2 from 

1 See page 661. 2 See page 456. 




Eleutherios Venizelos 



The Balkan and Italian Fronts 



685 



the grasp of Austria-Hungary, her traditional foe. Further- 
more, Great Britain, France, and Russia, by a secret treaty, 
had promised Italy a considerable portion of Ital 3 . Qins 
the Dalmatian coast and the adjacent islands, the Allies, 
besides a share of Turkish territories ; should ay ' 
the Ottoman Empire be partitioned as a result of the war. 
While the pressure of national interests thus influenced the de- 
cision of the Italian government, even more compelling, per- 
haps, was the conviction on the part of the Italian people that 




■ Farthest Italian Advance 

■ Battle Line, March, 1918 



The Italian Front 



the Allies were fighting in a just cause for everything that man- 
kind holds dear. Italy, an ancient home of civilization, would 
aid her Latin sister France in defending civilization against 
what seemed a fresh inroad of the Germanic barbarians. 

The entrance of Italy added another front and almost com- 
pleted the encirclement of the Central Powers. Italian armies 
marched against Trieste and the Trentino, but Italian 
for a long time made slow progress. The Austrians campaigns 
held the crests of the mountains and the passes ; consequently, 



686 The World War 

the Italians had to force their way upward in the face of the 

enemy. During the summer of 191 6 they finally crossed the 

Isonzo River and occupied Gorizia on the way to Trieste. 

The break-up of Russia after the revolution freed large forces 

of the Central Powers for service against Italy. An Austro- 

German attack, late in 191 7, undid all that the Italians had 

accomplished in more than two years of hard fighting and 

forced them back as far as the Piave River. There, with some 

aid from French and British troops, the Italians checked their 

foes. 

The military situation in Europe at the end of 191 7 clearly 

favored the Central Powers. On the western front they held 

The Allies Luxemburg, nearly all of Belgium, and a broad 

and the strip of northern France containing: valuable coal 

Central . 

Powers an< ^ ^ ron mines - On the eastern front they held 

1917 Poland, Lithuania, and Courland, the richest indus- 

trial districts of the Russian Empire. They had overrun 
Serbia, Montenegro, and a large part of Rumania. They had 
taken most of Venetia from the Italians. Their only terri- 
torial losses to the Allies were in southern Alsace and eastern 
Galicia. A different picture, however, was presented outside 
of Europe and on the sea. 

184. The War outside of Europe and on the Sea, 
1914-1917 

The sea-power of the Allies enabled them to capture Ger- 
many's colonial possessions. The British and French seized 

Togo and the Cameroons in West Africa. British 
Capture ° 

of the troops from the Union of South Africa, assisted by 

German loyal Boers, took German Southwest Africa, and 

colonies . . . . ' 

in cooperation with Belgian forces took German 

East Africa. The German possessions in the Pacific were 

conquered by the Australians, the New Zealanders, and the 

Japanese. 

Japan promptly entered the war on the side of the Allies. 

She had not forgotten the kaiser's slighting references to the 

"Yellow Peril" nor the fact that Germany had been chiefly 



The War outside of Europe and on the Sea 687 



instrumental in depriving her of Port Arthur, after the Chino- 

Japanese War in 1895. 1 Moreover, Japan had entered into 

an alliance with Great Britain providing for mutual 

support were the territorial rights or special inter- Kiauchau, 

ests of either power in the Far East threatened 1914 

by another power. 2 Japan's special contribution to the Allied 

cause was the capture of Kiauchau, the German naval base 

and stronghold in the Far East. 

Germany's ally, Turkey, 
suffered the loss of her out- 
lying possessions. ftedng of 
Great Britain Egypt and 
proclaimed a pro- AraDia 
tectorate over Egypt and set 
up a new ruler, who was to be 
quite independent of the sul- 
tan at Constantinople. The 
British also encouraged a re- 
volt of the Arabs against 
Turkey. Arab troops secured 
Mecca and Medina, the sacred 
places of Arabia, and estab- 
lished the kingdom of the 
Hejaz, which extends along 
the eastern coast of the Red 
Sea. 

Two other countries, long 
under the heel of the Turk, 
owed their liberation to Great Britain. An expeditionary force, 
largely composed of Indian contingents, invaded 
Mesopotamia by way of the Tigris River and Mestpo-^ 
entered Bagdad in triumph (March, 1917). An- tamia and 
other British army, starting from Egypt, invaded Palestine 
Palestine and took possession of Jerusalem (December, 1917). 
The Holy City, after nearly seven centuries, was again in 
Christian hands. 

1 See page 558. 2 See page 563. 




"The Last Crusade" 

Richard I (looking down on the Holy City) : 
" My dream comes true." A cartoon which 
appeared in Punch, Dec. 19, 1917, at the 
time of the British capture of Jerusalem. 



688 The World War 

The fleets of the Allies quickly swept the merchantmen of 
the Central Powers from the ocean and compelled their war- 
Allied ships to keep the shelter of home ports. The few 
control of German raiders which remained at large after 
hostilities began were either captured or sunk. 
Once only did the German "High Seas Fleet" slip out of Kiel 
Harbor, to be met by the British fleet off the coast of Jutland 
(May 31, 1916). Both sides suffered heavy losses in the en- 
gagement which followed. With the approach of darkness, 
however, the German ships returned to their safe anchorage 
and did not emerge again during the remainder of the war. 

Allied control of the sea led to an immediate blockade of 
Germany and Austria-Hungary. Three results followed. The 
The Allies were able freely to import food and raw 

blockade materials from their colonies and neutral states. 

They kept the ocean lanes safe for the transportation of troops 
from Africa, India, Australia, and Canada, meanwhile prevent- 
ing the return of Austro-German reservists from the United 
States and other countries. Finally, the Allies extinguished the 
commerce of the Central Powers, who were henceforth hard 
pressed to find the necessary sinews of war for their armies and 
food for their civilian population. 

As the war continued, the Allied blockade became more and 
more stringent. At first, it prevented the importation into 
E . Germany only of munitions and other materials 

of the used for military purposes. In February, 1915, 

blockade Great Britain also declared foodstuffs contraband, 

and as such liable to seizure if carried from neutral countries 
in neutral ships to Germany. The British justified their action 
on the ground that the German government had already com- 
mandeered the stocks of grain in private hands to insure the 
feeding of its armies, in other words, had itself treated food- 
stuffs as practically indispensable to the conduct of the war. 

The Central Powers relied on submarines (U-boats) to break 
Submarine the blockade. During the first months of the war 
warfare ^ e submarines attacked only enemy warships, 

but before long they began to destroy without warning 



The War outside of Europe and on the Sea 689 

enemy merchantmen. This was in flagrant defiance of inter- 
national law, which requires that a cargo or a passenger ship, 
under either an enemy or a neutral flag, shall be warned before 
being attacked and every effort made to safeguard human lives. 
After the British action in making food contraband, Germany 
went so far as to declare the waters around the British Isles 
a "war zone," where all enemy merchantmen would be sunk, 
whether or not passengers and crews could be rescued. Neutral 




German Barred Zone (February i, 1917) 



vessels were also warned against trespassing within the zone. 
It goes without saying that this declaration constituted only a 
"paper blockade," of the sort that had been already prohibited 
by international law. The attempt to enforce the blockade 
by piratical means brought about the entrance of the United 
States into the World War. 



690 The World War 

185. Intervention of the United States 

President Wilson announced the neutrality of the United 

States immediately upon the outbreak of hostilities. No 

„,, TT . s other course seemed possible, in view of our tradi- 

The United , . ' 

States as tional policy of non-interference in European 

a neutral affairs and our peaceful temper. The President 
also asked for neutrality of sentiment on the part of the Ameri- 
can people, so that the United States, as the one great nation 
at peace, might in time be able to mediate between the warring 
countries. While the government did remain neutral, Ameri- 
can citizens could not avoid taking sides. The Central Powers 
had many active sympathizers, especially among those of Ger- 
man birth or parentage. Public opinion, however, favored 




The " Lusitania ". 

the Allies; above all, France, to whom we owed our liberty, 
and Belgium, so innocent and so cruelly wronged. But as yet 
there was little thought of our active participation in the war. 
Before long the United States was drawn into diplomatic 
controversies with the belligerents. President Wilson made 
repeated and vigorous protests to Great Britain regarding 
Submarine alleged infringements by that country of our neutral 
atrocities rights at sea, especially the detention of American 
ships in British ports to determine whether or not they carried 
contraband goods. But Germany's proclamation of a "war 
zone" raised a much more serious issue. President Wilson 
protested at once, declaring that the United States would hold 
the German government to a "strict accountability" for 
American ships destroyed or American citizens killed. Ger- 



Intervention of the United States 



691 



many disclaimed all responsibility for "accidents" which might 
occur. U-boats proceeded to torpedo the great British liner 
Lusitania, with the loss of over one hundred American men, 
women, and children (May 7, 1915), 1 and also attacked American 
ships and those of other neutral nations. A "war of notes" 
between the United States and Germany finally extorted a 
German pledge not to sink merchant vessels without warning, 
unless they attempted to escape or offered resistance (May, 
19 1 6). Germany never intended to keep her pledge any longer 
than convenient, as the frank Bethmann-Hollweg afterwards 
admitted in a public statement. 
At the end of January, 191 7, she 
notified the American government 
of her purpose to sink at sight all 
ships, both enemy and neutral, 
found within certain areas adjoin- 
ing the British Isles, France, and 
Italy, and in the eastern Mediter- 
ranean. Only narrow " safety 
lanes " to one British port and to 
Greek waters were left open for a 
limited amount of neutral traffic 
inside the barred zone. Germany 
thus proposed to violate every 
right to the freedom of the seas 
for which the United States had 
ever contended. President Wilson then severed diplomatic 
relations with the German government. This act did not 
necessarily mean war, but it prepared the way for war. 

Submarine atrocities combined with Austro-German intrigues 
and conspiracies throughout the United States to arouse the 
warlike temper of the American people. From i ntrigues 
the very start official and non-official representa- and con- 
tives of the Central Powers had done all they could spin 
to destroy munition plants and steel factories supplying the 
Allies. Funds were sent to the German ambassador for use 




The German "Lusitania" 
Medal 

The obverse, shown here, bears under 
the legend Keine Bannware (" No Con- 
traband ") a representation of the sink- 
ing ship. The designer of the medal 
has added guns and airplanes which, 
however, the Lusitania did not carry. 



1 In all, 119s persons were drowned. 



692 



The World War 



S.j.R eg. .WBL.C RESOLUTlON.^Ng /-^ ,,^ C0NGRES s,) ,;g*T^ 



^ida-fift^ Congress of ijje fflnilto States of America; 

&t th£ prst Session, 

Begun and held at the Gty of WuUngton on Monday, the second day of April, 
one thomand nine hundred sad sneoteen. 



JOINT RESOLUTION 



Declaring that a state of war exists between the Imperial German Government 
and the Government and the people of the United States and making 
provision to prosecute the samo. 



Whereas the Imperial German Government has committed repeated acts of 
war against tho Government and the people of the United States of 
America: Therefore be it 

Resolved by the Senate, ami House of Representatives of tit* United States 
of America in Couyress assembled. That the state of war between the United 
Stdtcs and the Imperial German Government which has thins been thrust upon • 
the United States in hereby formally declared; and that the President be, and 
he is hereby, authorized and directed to employ the entile naval and military 
fiinvs of tlio Vnitcd Stud* and the resources of the Government to carry on war 
against the lini>erial fiemiun Government; and to bring the conflict to a 
Mieccwful termination all of the resources of tho country are hereby pledged by 
the Congress of the I'nited Stales. , sp? 



Speaker 0/ the Jlonse of Representatives. 






President of the Senate. 



, ice f resident of the United States and 



The United States Declaration of War 



Intervention of the United States 693 

in bribing Congress to declare an embargo on the traffic in 
munitions. Spies were multiplied throughout the country. 
Efforts were made to foment ill feeling in the United States 
against Japan and in Mexico against the United States. When 
Germany was about to proclaim unrestricted submarine war- 
fare and believed the intervention of the United States would 
follow, she even invited Mexico to enter an alliance with her, 
promising aid in helping that country recover the American 
Southwest. Such actions convinced our people that Germany 
and her satellites were running amuck under irresponsible rulers 
and that national safety, no less than national honor, required 
us to take the side of the Allies. 

American intervention soon became an accomplished fact. 
The President, in an address before a special session of Congress, 
urged that since Germany had repeatedly com- The United 
mitted hostile acts against the United States, we States as a 
should formally accept the status of belligerent belh s erent 
thus thrust upon us. Congress responded by declaring war on 
Germany (April 6, 19 17). Similar action was taken as to 
Austria-Hungary in December of the same year. Diplomatic 
relations with Turkey and Bulgaria were also broken. 

America, the President said, had no quarrel with the people 
of the Central Powers, who had been led blindly into the war. 
America's quarrel was with their autocratic gov- American 
ernments. She asked nothing for herself, neither war aims 
annexations nor indemnities. She fought to put down divine- 
right monarchy, secret diplomacy, and militarism, to promote 
among mankind that ordered liberty under law which she had 
long enjoyed, and to "make the world safe for democracy." 
In such a cause American citizens were privileged to spend 
their lives and their fortunes. 

The United States prepared on a colossal scale for the war. 
Several battleships were immediately sent to Europe, besides 
a large number of torpedo boats and destroyers . 

Am Gric3.ii 

to fight the German submarines. The American war 
navy, with some assistance from that of Great P re P arations 
Britain, also planted more than 70,000 mines in the North 



694 



The World War 



Sea for a distance of 240 miles from the Orkney Islands to the 
coast of Norway. This deadly barrage was laid down in 1918. 
It effectually shut out German submarines from ingress 




North Sea Mine Fields 

into the Atlantic, for the narrow strait of Dover had already 
been closed by mines and nets. The government adopted 
conscription as the most rapid and democratic method of 
raising an army, and two months after the declaration of war 
over ten million young men were registered for service. Of- 
ficers' training camps were established, and thirty-two canton- 
ments — virtual cities, each housing forty thousand men — 



Intervention of the United States 



695 



were set up within ninety days to accommodate the private 
soldiers under training. Congress made huge appropriations 
for the construction of airplanes, for building cargo ships to re- 
place those sunk by the enemy, for loans to the Allies, and for 
the purchase of immense 
quantities of food, clothing, 
rifles, machine guns, artil- 
lery, munitions, and all the 
other equipment of a mod- 
ern fighting force. The 
money was raised partly by 
increased taxation, partly 
by borrowing (the Liberty 
Loans). Other features of 
the American war program 
included fuel control, food 
control, under the efficient 
direction of Mr. Herbert 
Hoover, and government 
operation of railroads, ex- 
press companies, and tele- 
graph and telephone lines. At the same time, American engi- 
neers in France constructed docks, storage depots, barracks, and 
even entire railways for the reception of America's armies. 

Several countries which so far had remained neutral fol- 
lowed the example of the United States during 1917. Cuba, 
Panama, Brazil, Siam, Liberia, and China all 
flung down the gauntlet to Germany. Including aga j ns t the 
Portugal, which joined the Allies during 191 6, Central 
nineteen sovereign states were now ranged against 
the four Central Powers. 1 

The most important effort from a neutral source to end the 
war by negotiations came from Pope Benedict XV. On 

1 Ten Latin- American countries also broke oS diplomatic relations with Ger- 
many in 1917. They were Costa Rica, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, 
Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Santo Domingo, and Uruguay. The first five of these 
declared war against Germany during 191 8. Salvador declared a benevolent 
neutrality toward the United States, but did not actually enter the war. 




Herbert Hoover 



6 9 6 



The World War 




The Russian Revolution 697 

August 1, 1917, he addressed the belligerent nations, proposing, 
in the main, a return to conditions which existed before 1914. 
Occupied territories were to be evacuated by both Peace 
sides ; indemnities were to be waived ; and the proposals of 
questions relating to Alsace-Lorraine, the Trentino, 
Poland, and other regions were to be settled in a conciliatory 
spirit. The pope further urged a decrease of armaments, the 
establishment of compulsory arbitration, and, in general, the 
substitution of the "moral force of right" for the "material 
force of arms." President Wilson replied to this appeal as 
spokesman of the Allies, declaring that no peace which would 
endure could be made with the autocratic and irresponsible 
German government. 

On January 8, 19 18, the President in an address to Congress 
set forth fourteen points of a program for a just and lasting 
peace. They included: abolition of secret di- The 
plomacy ; removal of economic barriers between " Fourteen 
the nations ; reduction of armaments to the lowest Points 
point consistent with national safety ; freedom of the seas ; im- 
partial adjustment of colonial claims ; evacuation by Germany 
of all conquered territory and the restoration of Belgium; 
readjustment of Italian frontiers along the lines of nationality ; 
an independent Poland; self-government for the different 
peoples of Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire; and, 
finally, the formation of a general association of nations "for 
the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political in- 
dependence and territorial integrity to great and small states 
alike." These proposals were generally accepted abroad as a 
succinct statement of the purposes of the Allies in the World 
War. 

186. The Russian Revolution 

The Russian Revolution, beginning on the eve of American 
intervention, revealed the war more clearly than ever as no 
mere conflict for the preservation of the balance « Dark 
of power in Europe, but as a world-wide struggle forces " in 
between democracy and autocracy. Popular up- 
risings in Russia between 1905 and 1906 had compelled the 



698 The World War 

tsar to grant a national legislature (Duma), without, however, 
seriously weakening the position of the government. 1 The war 
disclosed how inefficient, weak, and even corrupt that govern- 
ment was. Late in 1916 the pro-German party at the court, 
including the tsar's German wife, secretly began negotiations 
with the Central Powers for a separate peace. Patriotic Rus- 
sians in the Duma passed a resolution that "dark forces" in 
high places were betraying the nation's interest. Neverthe- 
less, the intrigue went on, and the demoralization of Russia 
proceeded apace. 

A severe shortage of food in Petrograd brought matters to 
a crisis. Rioting broke out, and the troops were ordered to sup- 
press it with bullet and bayonet in the usual 
of the tsar pitiless fashion. But the old army, so long the 
March 15, prop of autocracy, languished in German prison 
camps 01 lay underground. The new army, mostly 
recruited from peasants and workingmen since the war, refused 
to fire on the people. Autocracy found itself helpless. The 
Duma then induced the tsar to sign the penciled memorandum 
which ended the Romanov dynasty after three hundred and 
four years of absolute power. 2 

The revolutionists set up a provisional government, headed 
by the executive committee of the Duma. Nearly all the 
members belonged to the party of Constitutional 
the Con- Democrats, representing the middle class, or 

stitutional bourgeoisie. Many liberal reforms were announced: 
liberty of speech and of the press; the right of 
suffrage for both men and women; a general amnesty for all 
political offenders and Siberian exiles; and a constituent 
assembly to draw up a constitution for Russia. The United 
States and the western Allies promptly recognized the new 
government. 

Socialists did not rest satisfied with these measures. They 

planned to give the revolution an economic rather than merely 

a political character. Throughout Russia they organized 

Soviets, or councils representing workingmen and soldiers. The 

1 See page 520. 2 See page 304. 



The Russian Revolution 699 

most important of these bodies was the Petrograd Council of 
Workingmen's and Soldiers' Delegates. The socialistic propa- 
ganda for a general peace on the basis of "no 
annexations and no indemnities" also made rapid 
headway with the army at the front. The troops began to 
elect their own officers, to fraternize with the enemy, and 
to desert in large numbers. Before long the Petrograd 
soviet, having won the support of the army, abolished the 
Duma as a stronghold of the bourgeoisie and replaced the 
Constitutional Democrats in the provisional government with 
socialists. 

The socialist leader was a young lawyer named Alexander 
Kerensky. His impassioned oratory gave him great influence, 
and by July, 191 7, he had become practical die- Alexander 
tator. But Kerensky turned out to be neither a Kerensky 
Cromwell nor a Napoleon, at a time when Russia required a 
combination of both for her salvation. A moderate socialist, 
he did not please the Constitutional Democrats, and he pleased 
the radical socialists still less. In November, 191 7, a second 
revolution in Petrograd overthrew him and the provisional 
government which he headed. 

The two men who now seized the reins of power were Nicholas 
Lenin and Leon Trotsky. They belonged to the Bolsheviki, 1 
an organization of radical socialists. Lenin was Lenin and 
born of Russian parents and was brought up Trotsk y 
in the Orthodox faith. He received an education in economics 
and law at the University of Petrograd. His socialistic 
activities soon resulted in a three years' exile to Siberia. 
After his release he went abroad and became prominent in 
the revolutionary circles of many European capitals. Trotsky, 
a Russian Jew, also suffered exile to Siberia as an undesirable 
agitator, the first time for four years, the second time for life. 
Having managed to escape, Trotsky went to western Europe 
and later to the United States. After the Russian Revolution 
both men returned to their native country and engaged in so- 
cialistic propaganda, with the results that have been seen. 
1 A Russian word meaning "majority men." 



700 The World War 

Lenin became premier and Trotsky foreign minister (subse- 
quently minister of war) in the new government. 

The Bolsheviki proposed to conclude an immediate "demo- 
cratic peace," to confiscate landed estates, to nationalize fac- 
Boishevist tories and other agencies of production, and to 
rule transfer all authority to the Soviets. Their flag was 

the red flag; their ultimate aim, a revolution by the working 
classes in all countries. 

Russia, meanwhile, began to dissolve into its separate na- 
tionalities. Finns, Esthonians, Letts, Lithuanians, Ukrai- 
Break-up nians, Cossacks, and Siberians declared their in- 
of Russia dependence and set up governments of their own. 
To economic disorganization and political chaos were thus 
added civil wars. 

It was under these circumstances that Russia made peace 
with the Central Powers. The Bolsheviki agreed to pay an 
Treaty of immense indemnity and to recognize the inde- 
Brest- pendence, under German auspices, of both Finland 

March 3, an d the Ukraine. Poland, Lithuania, and Cour- 
1918 land, conquered by the Germans in 191 5, were 

surrendered to them, together with Livonia and Esthonia. 
This humiliating treaty deprived Russia of about a third of 
her population and a third of her territory, including the rich- 
est agricultural lands, the chief industrial districts, most of the 
iron mines and coal mines, and many of the principal railways 
of the former empire. Had the Brest-Litovsk Treaty endured, 
Germany would have been the real winner of the World War, 
whatever might have been the outcome of the conflict elsewhere 
in Europe. 

187. End of the War, 1918 

The satisfaction with which the western Allies greeted the 
overthrow of autocracy in Russia turned to dismay when that 
country, within a year, embraced radical social- 
at the ism and withdrew from the war. The Treaty 

beginning of Brest-Litovsk gave the Central Powers a free 
hand in the west. Great Britain, France, and 
Italy recognized this fact and prepared to remain on the de- 



End of the War 



701 




fensive until the United States should be able to throw the full 
weight of its resources into the struggle. The Allies could af- 
ford to wait. To the Central Powers a prolongation of the 
war spelled ruin. " Frightfulness " on the ocean had not broken 
the blockade or starved 
Great Britain or inter- 
rupted the stream of 
transports carrying 
American troops in ever 
larger numbers to Eu- 
rope. Germany realized 
that her supreme effort 
for world dominion must 
be made in 1918, or 
never. "If the enemy 
does not want peace," 
declared the kaiser," then 
we must bring peace to 
the world by battering 
in with the iron fist and 
shining sword the doors of those who will not have peace." * 
Having gathered every available man and gun, Field Mar- 
shal Hindenburg and his associate, General Ludendorff, on 
March 21, 1918, started a "drive" along the line German 
from Arras to La Fere. Their plan was obvious : " drives " 
to split the Anglo-French forces at the point of juncture on the 
Oise River; to roll each army back, the British upon the 
Channel, the French upon Paris ; and then to destroy each 
army separately. The battle which followed surpassed in 
intensity every previous engagement on the western front. 
By terrific massed attacks, the Germans regained in a few days 
all the ground so slowly and painfully won by the Allied of- 
fensives in 1916 and 191 7. The British were pushed back 
twenty-five miles, bringing the enemy within artillery range of 
Amiens and its important railway connections. The critical 
condition of affairs led the Allies to establish unity of action by 

1 Address to the Second German Army in France, December 22, 1917. 



Eric von Ludendorff 



702 



The World War 



putting their forces under the command of General Foch, an 
admirable strategist who shared with Joffre the glory of the 
Marne battle. Before this step was taken, General Pershing 
had already offered the entire American army to be used wher- 
ever needed by the Allies. The Germans in April launched 

another "drive" to the north, 
between Arras and Ypres, 
against the British guarding 
the road to the Channel ports. 
Again the enemy drove a deep 
wedge into the British line. 
French reinforcements arrived 
on the scene in time to check 
the German advance. A third 
"drive" at the end of May, 
between Soissons and Reims, 
brought the Germans back 
once more to the Marne at 
Chateau-Thierry, only forty- 
three miles from Paris, but 
French and American troops 
again halted the advance. Re- 
newed German efforts in June and July to pierce the Allied 
line and reach Paris were fruitless. And now the tide turned. 

General Foch, always an advocate of the offensive in warfare, 
found himself by midsummer able to put his theories into 
The turn practice. He now possessed the reinforcements 

of the tide sent by both Great Britain and Italy to help hold 

the long line from the sea to Switzerland, together with more 
than a million American soldiers — "Pershing's crusaders" — 
whose mettle had been already tested and not found wanting 
in minor engagements at Cantigny, in the Belleau Woods, 
and at Chateau-Thierry. July 18, 1918, is a memorable 
date, for on that day the Allies began the series of rapid counter- 
strokes, perfectly coordinated, which four months later brought 
the war on the western front to a victorious conclusion. How 
the French and Americans pinched the Germans out of the 




Ferdinand Foch 

From a portrait bust by the American artist, 
Jo Davidson 



End of the War 



703 



Marne salient ; how the Americans, in their first independent 
operation, swept the enemy from the St.-Mihiel salient, south 
of Verdun, and started an advance into German Lorraine which 
carried them to Sedan; how the British, with French and 
American assistance, broke the "Hindenburg Line"; how the 
Belgians, British, and French 
liberated Flanders — these are 
only the outstanding events of a 
period unsurpassed in interest 
and importance since the dawn 
of history. 

With disaster impending on the 
western front, Germany could no 
longer support her Armistice 
confederates in the with 
other theaters of the September 
war. Bulgaria was 29, 1918 
the first of the Central Powers to 
collapse. A vigorous offensive, 
begun during September by Brit- 
ish, Greek, Serbian, French, and 
Italian troops in the Balkans, split the Bulgarian armies apart, 
thus opening the way for an immediate advance upon Sofia. 
Bulgaria then surrendered unconditionally. Shortly afterwards 
Tsar Ferdinand abdicated. 

Turkey, now isolated from Germany and Austria-Hungary, 
was the second of the Central Powers to collapse. The cam- 
paign against the Turks during September and 

Armistice 

October formed an unbroken succession of vie- with T ur k ey> 
tories. British forces, keeping close touch with October 30, 

1918 

their Arab allies, advanced northward from the 
neighborhood of Jerusalem. They soon took Damascus, the 
capital of Syria, and entered Aleppo, close to the railway be- 
tween Constantinople and Bagdad. 1 At the same time, the 
British in Mesopotamia captured the Turkish army on the 
Tigris. Nothing remained for Turkey but to sign an armis- 

1 See the map on page 658. 




John J. Pershing 



704 The World War 

tice, which demobilized her troops and opened the road to 
Constantinople for the Allies. 

Simultaneously, Austria-Hungary collapsed. What may be 
called the second battle of the Piave 1 began at the end of 
Armistice October, when General Diaz, the Italian com- 
with Austria- man d er struck a sudden blow at the Austrian 

Hungary, 

November 3, armies and hurled them back along the whole 

1918 front from the Alps to the sea. The battle soon 

assumed the proportions of a disaster perhaps unequaled in the 

annals of war. Within a single week the Italians chased the 

Austrians out of northern Italy, entered Trent and Trieste, 

and captured three hundred thousand prisoners and five 

thousand guns. Austria-Hungary then signed an armistice 

which, as in the cases of Bulgaria and Turkey, amounted to an 

unconditional surrender. 

The military overthrow of the Dual Monarchy quickly led 

to its disintegration. Separate states arose, representing the 

, . various nationalities formerly subject to the Haps- 

Revolution J J . c . 

in Austria- burgs. Emperor Charles I bowed to the mevi- 

Hungary table and laid down the imperial crown which 

he had assumed in 191 6 upon the death of Francis Joseph I. 2 

Such was the end of the Hapsburg dynasty, rulers of Austria 

since the latter part of the thirteenth century. 

The Hohenzollerns also disappeared from the scene. As 
Germany during that fateful summer and autumn of 191 8 
Revolution began to taste the bitterness of defeat, the popular 
in Germany demand for peace and democratic government 
became an open summons to the kaiser to abdicate. He long 
resisted, vainly making one concession after another, until the 
red flag had been hoisted over the German fleet at Kiel, and 
Berlin and other cities were in the hands of revolutionists. Then 
he abdicated, both as emperor and king, and fled to Holland. 
The other German crowns quickly fell, like overripe fruit. 
Germany soon found itself a socialist republic, controlled by 
the Social Democrats. 3 

The armistice, which practically ended the war, was con- 
1 See page 686. 2 See page 521. 3 See page 619. 



End of the War 705 

eluded by the Allies and the United States with the new Ger- 
man government. It formed a long document of thirty-five 
clauses, covering every aspect of the military Armistice 
situation and making it impossible for Germany with 
to renew hostilities before the peace settlement. November 
Germany agreed to return all prisoners of war ; to H. 1918 
surrender her submarines, the best part of her fleet, and im- 
mense numbers of cannon, machine guns, and airplanes; to 
evacuate Belgium, Luxemburg, France, and Alsace-Lorraine; 
and to allow the joint occupation by Allied and American troops 
of the Rhinelands, together with the principal crossings of the 
Rhine (Mainz, Coblenz, and Cologne) and bridgeheads at these 
points on the right bank of the river. A neutral zone was 
reserved between the occupied territory and the rest of Ger- 
many. 1 The German government carried out these stringent 
terms under necessity. 

The sudden termination of hostilities found the greater part 
of Europe in confusion. The former empires of the Romanovs, 
Hapsburgs, and Hohenzollerns promised to break 
up into a large number of independent states, at the 
with new governments and a new distribution of end of 1918 
population. The problems for solution by the peace confer- 
ence included, therefore, not only the necessary arrangements 
for indemnities in money and territory to be paid by the Cen- 
tral Powers and the disposition of Germany's colonial pos- 
sessions, but also the creation of a dozen or more sovereign 
countries with boundaries so drawn as to satisfy all legitimate 
national aspirations. The World War was to be followed by 
a World Settlement. 

Studies 

1. Define the following: ultimatum, mobilization, reservists, blockade, contra- 
band of war, and salient. 2. Draw up a list of the countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, 
and America which remained entirely neutral during the World War. 3. Compare 
the World War, as to its epoch-making character, with (a) the Thirty Years' War ; 
(b) the Seven Years' War; and (c) the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. 4. 
Show that the assassination of the Austrian crown prince furnished an excuse rather 
than a reason for war. s- What were the "strategical grounds" for the German 

1 See the map, page 677. 



706 The World War 

invasion of Belgium? 6. Why has the possession of Antwerp been called "a pistol 
pointed at the heart of England"? 7. Is it likely that Great Britain would have 
become a belligerent if Belgian neutrality had not been violated? 8. What made 
the capture of Paris seem so vitally important to the Germans at the outset of the 
war? 9. The battle of the Mame has been called "one more decisive battle of 
the world." Comment on this statement. 10. How did the Austro-German vic- 
tories on the eastern and Balkan fronts contribute to the realization of "Middle 
Europe " ? 11. Did Japan have sufficient reason for declaring war against Germany ? 
12. On what grounds did President Wilson adopt a policy of neutrality ? 13. Show 
that the United States, as a neutral, could not properly place an embargo on the 
export of arms and munitions to the Allies. 14. Compare the German unrestricted 
submarine warfare with Napoleon's Continental System. 15. Enumerate the 
principal reasons for the entrance of the United States 1 in the war against Germany 
and Austria-Hungary. 16. Why did not the United States declare war on Bul- 
garia and Turkey? 17. How did the revolution in Russia lead to the disintegration 
of the country ? Contrast its results in this respect with the French Revolution. 
18. On an outline map indicate the territory surrendered by Russia according to 
the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. 19. Account for the rapid collapse of the Central 
Powers in the latter part of 191 8. 



CHAPTER XXI 
THE WORLD SETTLEMENT, 1919-1921 * 

188. The Peace Conference 

On January 18, 191 9, forty-eight years to a day from the 
proclamation of the German Empire in the palace of Louis XIV 
at Versailles, the Peace Conference assembled at 
Paris. It was a gathering which dwarfed into 
insignificance the Congress at Vienna or those still earlier 
congresses of Utrecht and Westphalia. They met to settle 
the affairs of Europe ; this one met to settle the affairs of the 
world. 

The delegates to the conference represented all the Allied 
and Associated countries (except Montenegro, Costa Rica, 
and Russia) and those which had severed diplo- 
matic relations with the Central Powers (except 
Santo Domingo). Neutral states were admitted to the 
conference only when matters affecting their particular inter- 
ests came up for discussion. Enemy states were altogether 
excluded. Premier Clemenceau of France was unanimously 
chosen chairman of the conference. 

The direction of affairs naturally fell to the United States, 
Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan. The two ranking 
delegates from each of these five powers con- The supreme 
stituted a Supreme Council to discuss and formulate Council 
the business of the conference. As time went on, the difficulty 
of reconciling the many diverse interests and of reaching a 
settlement satisfactory to all made it necessary to reduce the 
original council of ten members to one of five. Finally, Japan 
dropped from the inner circle, and the "Big Four," namely, 

1 Webster, Historical Source Book, No. 20, "Holy Alliance, 1815"; No. 33, 
"Covenant of the League of Nations, igig." 

707 




7o8 



The Peace Conference 709 

premiers Clemenceau, Lloyd George, and Orlando, and Presi- 
dent Wilson, decided among themselves the most important 
questions. 

The drafting of the peace treaty with Germany proceeded 
steadily. Early in May it was delivered to the German dele- 
gates, who had been summoned to Versailles for . 
the occasion. They tried to secure radical modi- the treaty, 
fication of its terms, but the Supreme Council June 28, 1919 
refused to make any important concessions. Germany was 
given the choice between immediate acceptance of the treaty 
and renewal of the war. Germany chose to accept it, and her 
decision brought a relief to tense nerves everywhere. The 
historic ceremony of signing occurred on June 28 in the Hall 
of Mirrors at Versailles. 

The last article of the treaty provided that it should become 
effective when ratified by Germany on the one hand and by 
three of the principal Allied and Associated powers 
on the other hand. Germany ratified it early in ratifications, 
July, and similar action was taken during the {q™ ary 10 ' 
following months of 1919 by Great Britain, France, 
and Italy. The exchange of ratifications took place on Janu- 
ary 10, 1920, in the Clock Hall of the French Foreign Ministry 
at Paris. From this day, therefore, the Allied powers and Ger- 
many were once more at peace. 

An Associated power still remained technically at war with 
Germany. The United States had not ratified the treaty ow- 
ing to opposition in the Senate, which, according 
to the Constitution, must concur by a two-thirds states and 
vote in all treaties made by the President. Sena- the treat y 
torial criticism was especially directed against certain features 
of the League of Nations, as inserted in the treaty. The chief 
stumbling-block was Article X of the covenant, which declares 
that "the members of the league undertake to respect and 
preserve as against external aggression the territorial integrity 
and existing political independence of all members of the 
league." Many senators believed that this article, by putting 
the military and naval forces of the United States at the dis- 



710 The World Settlement 

posal of the league, impaired the constitutional right of Con- 
gress to declare war, and might also result in foreign entangle- 
ments, which it has always been the American policy to avoid. 
When the treaty came to a vote in the Senate, it failed to pass 
by the necessary two-thirds majority. The rejection of the 
treaty made the League of Nations in its existing form the 
chief issue in the presidential campaign of 1920. The Re- 
publicans opposed the league and the Democrats upheld it. 
The Republican victory, resulting in the election of Senator 
Harding, was followed in the summer of 192 1 by the passage 
of a congressional resolution which declared the war of the 
United States with Germany at an end. This resolution was 
promptly signed by the President. Treaties of peace nego- 
tiated by the administration not only with Germany, but also 
with Austria and Hungary, were subsequently ratified by the 
Senate. 

189. Peace with Germany 

The Versailles treaty made the following modifications of 

Germany's western frontier. First of all, she restored Alsace 

and Lorraine to France. German misgovern- 
Germany s , , 

western ment of these two provinces since 1871 and the 

frontier evident desire of most of their people to be reunited 

to France furnish sufficient justification for the action of the 
Peace Conference. The possession of Alsace-Lorraine, practi- 
cally uninjured by the ravages of war, also helps to compen- 
sate France for the destruction wrought in her northern prov- 
inces. Second, Germany ceded to France absolutely the coal 
mines in the Saar Basin (north of Lorraine). 1 This area, which 
was taken from France in 181 5, is to be governed by the League 
of Nations until a plebiscite is held at the end of fifteen years 
to determine whether the inhabitants prefer French or Ger- 
man sovereignty. Thjrd, Germany agreed that northern 
Schleswig should return to Denmark in case a majority of the 
inhabitants voted for the change. 2 By this action the Allies 

1 See the map on page 465. 

J The results of the two plebiscites taken in 1920 gave a large part of northern 
Schleswig to Denmark. 









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712 The World Settlement 

sought to repair the injury done by Prussia to Denmark in 1864. 
Fourth, Germany relinquished certain small districts on her 
western frontier to Belgium. 

The restoration of Poland to a place among the nations 
necessitated sweeping changes in Germany's eastern frontier. 
Germany's She gave up much of Posen and West Prussia to 
eastern the new Polish state. She also renounced all 

rights over Danzig, which, with its environs, be- 
comes a free city under the protection of the League of 
Nations. This action assures to Poland uninterrupted access 
to the Baltic down the valley of the Vistula. These territorial 
losses must be borne by Prussia, which, in consequence, will 
no longer so completely overshadow the other German states. 
The Peace Conference thus undid much of Frederick the 
Great's and Bismarck's work for the exaltation of Prussia. 

Germany's name on a far-flung colonial empire was blotted 
from the map. All her possessions overseas were taken from her. 
The German German East Africa went to Great Britain, and 
colonies German Southwest Africa, to the Union of South 

Africa. Togo and the Cameroons were divided between France 
and Great Britain. These territories will henceforth be ad- 
ministered under mandates from the League of Nations. The 
mandate for the German Pacific islands north of the equator x is 
held by Japan, and that for the islands south of the equator, 2 
by Australia. New Zealand, however, received the mandate 
for German Samoa. Germany also renounced, in favor of 
Japan, all her rights in Kiauchau and the province of Shantung. 
Responsibility for all damages, both on the land and at sea, 
was assumed by Germany. After much haggling Germany 
agreed in 192 1 to pay over a series of years an 
indemnity of 132,000,000,000 gold marks (about 
$33,000,000,000), plus the amount of the Belgian debt, to the 
Allies, but less sums already paid on the reparation account or 
subsequently to be credited to it. Allied occupation of the 
Rhinelands will continue until reparation is completed. 

1 Pelew, Caroline, Ladrone, and Marshall Islands. 

* German New Guinea, Bismarck Archipelago, and northern Solomon Islands. 



Peace with Austria, Bulgaria, and Turkey 713 

The military, naval, and air clauses of the treaty were in- 
tended to make Germany innocuous. They include the 
abolition of conscription, the reduction of her R e d uct i on of 
army to 100,000 men, and the destruction of the armaments 
fortifications west of the Rhine, those in a thirty-mile zone 
on the east bank of the Rhine, those controlling the Baltic, 
and those on Helgoland. The German fleet was reduced to a 
few ships without submarines. Airplanes, seaplanes, and 
dirigible balloons are not to be maintained for purposes of 
war. The treaty also prohibits the importation, exportation, 
and nearly all production of war material for the future. These 
drastic requirements should pave the way for a general limita- 
tion of armaments by the nations. 

190. Peace with Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey 

The treaty with Austria was signed in September, 1919, 
at St. -Germain, near Paris. The St. -Germain treaty did little 
more than record an accomplished fact, namely, 

A ustri9. 

the disintegration of the Dual Monarchy. Austria 
ceded territory to Czecho-Slovakia and Jugoslavia and recog- 
nized their independence. Other parts of the Hapsburg realm 
were transferred to Italy (the Trentino and Adriatic posses- 
sions), to Poland (Galicia), and to Rumania (Bukowina). 1 The 
new Austrian Republic thus became a small inland state, Ger- 
man in culture and chiefly German in population. The treaty 
also embodied stringent provisions relating to reparation and 
disarmament. 

The treaty with Hungary was signed in June, 1920, at Ver- 
sailles. It reduced Hungary to another small state inhabited 
almost entirely by Magyars. Czecho-Slovakia 
secured that part of northern Hungary contain- 
ing a predominantly Slovak population; Rumania, the Ru- 
manian districts of Transylvania; and Jugoslavia, the Slo- 
venian and Croatian territories of Hungary. The demands 

1 Rumania has also acquired Transylvania from Hungary and Bessarabia from 
Russia, thus becoming the largest of the Balkan states. 



714 The World Settlement 

made upon Hungary for disarmament and reparation were 
substantially identical with those made upon Austria. 

The treaty with Bulgaria, as signed in November, 1919, at 
Neuilly, slightly rectified the western frontier of that state in 
favor of Jugoslavia. The frontier with Rumania 
remains as before the war. The most important 
boundary change is on the south, where Bulgaria relinquished 
part of Thrace to Greece. Bulgaria thus lost an outlet on the 
/Egean. She was also obliged to limit her army to 20,000 
men, surrender all warships and aircraft, and pay a total in- 
demnity of $445,000,000. 

The treaty with Turkey, as signed in August, 1920, at Sevres, 
restricted Ottoman territory in Europe to Constantinople and 
European its environs. What remained of European Tur- 
Turkey k e y was assigned to Greece. The shores of the 

Bosporus, the Sea of Marmora, and the Dardanelles were inter- 
nationalized, so that the gates of the Black Sea might hence- 
forth be free to all nations. 

Anatolia, the first seat of Ottoman power six centuries ago, 
continues to be under Turkish sovereignty. Greece, how- 
ever, has received administrative authority over 
the city of Smyrna and the adjoining region. This 
part of Asia Minor belonged to ancient Hellas and still contains a 
large Greek population. The Dodecanese (Sporades) Islands, 
which Italy occupied during the Turko-Italian War of 
1911-1912, have been ceded by that country to Greece, with 
the exception of Rhodes. Both racially and by historic tradi- 
tion the inhabitants of these islands are preponderantly Greek. 
The French hold Syria under a mandate and have announced 
their intention to remain there permanently. The interests of 
France in this part of the Levant are chiefly com- 
mercial, though there is a sentimental tradition 
dating back to Napoleon and even to the crusades. 

Great Britain received the mandate for Palestine. The 
British government is pledged to develop the 
Holy Land as a national home for the Jews — a 
people without a country for nearly eighteen hundred years. 




Trebi 







,^^e^-'" AN " s; "4 



EUROPE 

after the Peace Conference at Paris, 
1919-1920. 

Boundaries Settled Boundaries Unsettled 

::"::::: ::":::J International Territory [ ...."I l'louiscites 

Principal Railroads x— . Ship Canals 

Scale of Miles 
1 00 200 3 00 -iOO SQ O 
THE MATTHEWS HORTHRUP WORKS, BUFFALO, W.T. 



The New Nations in Central Europe 715 

The Arab kingdom of the Hejaz testifies to a new birth of 
Islam. The Young Turks, in their efforts to "Ottomanize" 
all the peoples of the Ottoman Empire, only 
succeeded in alienating the Arabs, who have never ejaz 
forgotten that from their land came the Prophet, that in it are 
the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and that Arabic is the 
sacred language of the Koran. An Arab revolt against Turkey 
broke out in 1916, under the leadership of Husein, a descendant 
of Mohammed and official head of Mecca. He was promptly 
recognized as king of the Hejaz, or western Arabia, by the 
Entente Powers. 

Great Britain has also been made the mandatary for 
Mesopotamia. British administration ought to redeem this 
region, naturally one of the most favored in the Mesopo- 
world, from the long blight to which it has been tamia 
subjected by centuries of Turkish misgovernment. With 
scientific agriculture and irrigation it would soon become such 
a granary of the Near East as it was in ancient times. 

191. The New Nations in Central Europe 

It was altogether fitting that one result of the victorious 

struggle against the Central Powers should be the establishment 

of many new nations in both central and eastern . ■_ .. 

J . Submerged 

Europe. Germany after her unification and nationali- 

Austria-Hungary and Turkey throughout the nine- ties " 
teenth century systematically opposed nationalism as a force 
disruptive of their empires. Russia also upheld the same 
policy. Each of these countries contained numerous "sub- 
merged nationalities" governed against their will by those 
whom they considered aliens. The defeat of the Central Powers 
and the Russian Revolution offered, therefore, a unique op- 
portunity to remake the European map in the name and in the 
interest of all its peoples, great and small. 

The South Slavs (Jugoslavs) in 19 14 were distributed chiefly 
in the independent states of Serbia and Montenegro 

Tuffoslflvifl 

and in the following provinces of Austria-Hun- 
gary : Bosnia, and Herzegovina, Dalmatia, Croatia-Slavonia, 



716 The World Settlement 

and Carniola. In order to establish the state of Jugoslavia, 
(officially known as the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and 
Slovenes) both Serbia and Montenegro gave up their separate 
governments and united with the former Jugoslav provinces of 
Austria-Hungary. The first ruler of the new kingdom is 
Alexander I, crown prince of Serbia. Belgrade is the capital. 
A long and bitter dispute between Jugoslavia and Italy over 
the ownership of Fiume, an important port on the Adriatic, 
has finally been settled by erecting Fiume into a free state, 
with a government of its own. 

The Albanian principality created by the powers in 1913 
disappeared completely soon after the opening of the World 
War. Albania now has a provisional government. 
The country is still very backward, lacking good 
highways, railroads, newspapers, and post offices, while the 
antipathy between its Christian and Moslem inhabitants 
makes for dissension. 

How unwillingly the Czechs and the Slovaks fought for the 
Dual Monarchy in the war is a matter of common knowledge. 
The Czecho- More than one hundred thousand Czecho-Slovaks 
Slovaks surrendered to the Russians, and many of them 

promptly enlisted in the tsar's armies. After the Russian 
Revolution it was the Czecho-Slovaks in Siberia who for a 
time held that vast country against the Bolsheviki. Czecho- 
slovaks from Great Britain, France, Italy, and the United States 
also volunteered in large numbers for service on the western 
front. There are few finer episodes in history than this spon- 
taneous uprising of a whole nation. 

The collapse of the Dual Monarchy was followed almost im- 
mediately by the setting-up of a Czecho-Slovak state. It em- 
Czecho- braces Bohemia, Moravia, and Austrian Silesia, 

Slovakia which together formed an independent kingdom 

until its annexation by Austria in 1526, and also Slovakia. The 
latter country, once a part of Moravia, has been a Magyar 
dependency for centuries. Czecho-Slovakia is a republic with a 
constitution patterned after that of the United States. The 
first president is T. G. Masaryk, formerly a professor in the 



The New Nations in Eastern Europe 717 

University of Prague. The new republic occupies a central 
position between the Baltic and the Adriatic. It is rich in 
natural resources, is advanced in agriculture, trade, and manu- 
facturing, and is well provided with common schools. Czecho- 
slovakia has every assurance of a prosperous and happy 
future. 

Hard, indeed, was the fate of the Poles during the World 
War. Those in Russian Poland had to fight against their 
brothers in Galicia, Posen, and West Prussia. 

The Poles 

Much of their country formed a fiercely contested 
battle-ground, and destruction, famine, and death followed 
everywhere in the wake of the contending armies. In 19 14 the 
tsar, Nicholas II, promised autonomy to all the Poles, both 
those in Russia and those to be liberated from Austrian and 
German rule. Germany also proposed to set up a Polish state 
under German tutelage. It was reserved for the Peace Con- 
ference, however, to create the free and independent Poland 
of 1919. 

Restored Poland includes nearly all the territory taken from 
that country by Austria and Prussia in the partitions of the 
eighteenth century. The Allies have also given 
Poland mandatory powers for twenty-five years 
over eastern Galicia, the population of which is partly Polish 
and partly Ruthenian. Disputes about the remainder of 
Poland's eastern boundary led to hard fighting between the 
Poles and the Bolsheviki during 1920. As the outcome of 
negotiations with the Soviet government, Poland finally ac- 
quired considerably more territory than had been allotted to 
her by the Peace Conference. Like her Czecho-Slovak neighbor, 
Poland is a republic. She has bound herself by a special treaty 
with the Allies to maintain free institutions, under the aegis of 
the League of Nations. 

192. The New Nations in Eastern Europe 

All the various peoples on the western border of the Russian 
Empire profited by the break-up of the tsar's government to 



718 The World Settlement 

establish independent republics. Their boundaries, except in 

the case of Finland, have not yet been definitely 
Republics . it • 

in western determined. The republics are Finland, Esthonia, 

Russia Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukrainia. 

The Swedes conquered Finland in the twelfth century and 
retained it until 1809. Finland, with the Aland Islands, then 
entered the Russian Empire as a semi-independent 
grand duchy. The Finnish parliament in 191 7 
declared for complete separation from Russia. For the next 
two years Finland had to contend with both the Bolsheviki and 
the Germans, but Germany's collapse restored liberty to the 
country. It was soon recognized as an independent republic 
by the principal Allied powers. 

The provisional government of Russia in 191 7 granted 
Esthonia a parliament, or Diet, to be elected by universal 
suffrage. After the triumph of the Bolsheviki in 
Russia, the Diet proclaimed Esthonian independ- 
ence. The Germans subsequently occupied the country, but 
their dream of annexing it went the way of the other Pan- 
German schemes. Esthonia has signed a peace treaty with 
the Soviet government, by which Russia abdicates all rights 
over her former Baltic possession. 

The Letts, who call themselves Latvis, dwell for the most 

part in the former Russian provinces of Courland and Livonia, 

around the Gulf of Riga. They, too, have had 

to fight for freedom against both German armies 

and the Bolsheviki, before securing national existence. 

The grand duchy of Lithuania, which united with Poland in 
1569, became a part of the Russian Empire after the partitions 
of Poland in the eighteenth century. The tsar's 
government made every effort to "Russify" the 
inhabitants, extinguish their sense of nationality, and force 
upon them the Orthodox Church. Such was the situation when 
the World War broke out. The Germans overran Lithuania 
during their great offensive of 19 15, only to evacuate it three 
years later after the signing of the armistice. Lithuania then 
proclaimed itself an independent republic. 



Democracy and Socialism 719 

The Ukrainians (Little Russians, Ruthenians J ) number about 
30,000,000, including many Cossacks. Their country fell under 
the sway of Poland-Lithuania toward the close of 

T J Iff Q I Tl j fl 

the Middle Ages and did not become a part of the 
tsar's dominions until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 
With its broad, fertile plains devoted to agriculture and stock 
raising and its rich deposits of coal and minerals, Ukrainia bids 
fair to occupy an important place in Europe. The present 
Bolshevist government is allied with and subservient to Russia. 
The student will recall that during the nineteenth century 
Russia widened her boundaries by the annexation of districts 
on both sides of the Caucasus Mountains. The _. 

The 

Caucasian peoples have set up three republics, Caucasian 
namely, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia. re P ubllcs 
Nowhere else in the world have so many different tribes, 
languages, and religions been gathered together. At least fifty 
different dialects are spoken in this region. Most of the Cau- 
casian peoples are Mohammedans, but the Georgians belong to 
the Greek Church and the Armenians have a national Church of 
their own. Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia are now prac- 
tically dependencies of Russia and are under Soviet Bolshevist 
governments. 

193. Democracy and Socialism 

When the World War began, two-thirds of Europe was under 

autocratic rule. Germany, which refused to accept either the 

principles or the practice of democracy, found . . 

tr r r- j j Autocracy 

natural support in Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, versus 
and Turkey. Autocratic Russia, it is true, fought democrac y 
on the side of the Allies, but the Russian Revolution promised 
to enroll that country among liberal states. The triumph of 
the Central Powers would not only have dashed the hopes of all 
the "submerged nationalities" in Europe ; it would have imper- 
iled the existence of popular government everywhere. Germany 
and her satellites in 1914 flung down a challenge to the liberties 
of mankind. 

1 The name Ruthenian is sometimes restricted to the Little Russians who were 
formerly Austrian subjects in Galicia and Bukowina. 



720 The World Settlement 

All know how that challenge was met. Two emperors, those 
of Germany and Austria ; two tsars, those of Russia and Bul- 
Sovereigns garia ; six kings, those of Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria, 
dethroned Wiirtemberg, Hungary, and Greece, and a crowd 
of princes, dukes, and grand dukes renounced their hereditary 
rights and sought refuge either in obscurity or in exile. More 
than a score of sovereigns dethroned represents part of the 
balance sheet of the war. 

With the emperors, kings, princes, dukes, and grand dukes 
went the whole theory of absolutism and divine right. Mon- 
archy itself disappeared in most of central and 
Absolutism • ... _ 

and divine eastern Europe, only the five Balkan states, Ru- 

right dis- mania, Bulgaria, Jugoslavia, Greece, and Turkey 
credited . . , _. 

retaining a semblance of one-man rule. The war 

revealed, clearly enough, what ruin might be caused by the 

vanity, selfishness, and ambition of a few persons. They had 

long menaced the peace and happiness of the world. At last, 

the world is done with them. 

It was quite natural that the socialists should have assumed 
the leadership of the revolutionary movements in many Euro- 
The social- pean countries. There are two types of socialism, 
istic upheaval however. Moderate socialists rely on the ballot to 
abolish capitalism and introduce state ownership of the means 
of production : they are democrats in their political thinking 
and accept the democratic principle of majoiity rule. Radical 
or extreme socialists advocate violent means of overthrowing 
the capitalistic middle class, the hated bourgeoisie, in order to 
set up a dictatorship of the proletariat. The contrast between 
the two socialistic parties is well marked in Germany, where 
the principles of Karl Marx and his followers first became 
popular among workingmen. 

The Social Democrats before the war were the chief opponents 
of militarism and autocracy in Germany, and even in 1914 a 
The German bold minority of them resisted the war fever then 
Republic sweeping over the country. The events of 19 18 

strengthened their hands ; both the army and the navy became 
saturated with the revolutionary spirit ; and a few days before 



Democracy and Socialism 721 

the signing of the armistice in November the uprising occurred 
which sent the Hohenzollerns into exile and established a social- 
istic government, with Friedrich Ebert at its head. The mod- 
erate socialists in control of affairs immediately encountered 
the opposition of the radicals, who planned to deprive the bour- 
geoisie of all power and establish a proletarian regime. There 
were bitter conflicts between the radicals and the republican 
troops. Law and order finally triumphed, after much 
bloodshed. 

Ebert and his associates gave Germany a permanent govern- 
ment through a national assembly which met at Weimar in 
1919 and drafted a constitution. This was speedily ratified 
by a popular vote. The new Germany is essentially a federative 

republic, though still described by the old name _ , x x . 
« . . . . Constitution 

Reich, or Empire. Foreign affairs, colonies, im- f the 

migration and emigration, military organization, p erm ^ 
coinage, taiiffs, and posts, telegraphs, and tele- 
phones are reserved to the nation as a whole. The confeder- 
ated states may legislate on many other matters, subject, how- 
ever, to the prior right of legislation by the nation. Every state 
must have a republican form of government, with representatives 
chosen in secret ballot by all German citizens, both men and 
women. 

The constitution retains certain time-honored forms and 
features of the old government. The Imperial Council (Reichs- 
rat), which replaces the Bundesrat, consists of 
delegates from the confederated states. Each state and 
is to have at least one vote, and in the case of the Reichsta e 
larger states one vote will be accorded to every million inhabit- 
ants. No state, however, can have more than two-fifths of 
all the votes in the Reichsrat. This clause of the constitution 
should prevent the control of the council by Prussia. Long 
impotent under the old imperial regime, the Reichstag now be- 
comes the supreme law-making body. The Reichsrat may, 
indeed, refuse assent to a measure passed by the Reichstag, but 
its veto can be overridden by a two-thirds vote of the latter 
assembly. 



i 



722 The World Settlement 

The president of Germany is to be elected by the entire people 
for a term of seven years. He is eligible to reelection. The 
., president makes treaties, selects public officials, 

and commands the military forces, and appoints and 

chancellor dismisses the chancellor, together with other mem- 
bers of the ministry. The constitutional provision requir- 
ing that the chancellor and his associates shall hold office only 
as long as they retain the confidence of the Reichstag gives to 
Germany substantially cabinet government. 

Austria also became a republic. A National Assembly, in 

which the socialists had the largest representation, met in 

ioio and framed a liberal constitution. The 
The i 

Austrian assembly declared for the union of Austria with 

Republic Germany. The Allies have not as yet consented 

to this long-delayed unification of the German-speaking peoples 

of central Europe. One of the clauses of the St. -Germain 

treaty makes such action dependent upon the approval of the 

council of the League of Nations. 

The Hungarian People's Republic came into existence shortly 
Th after the signing of the armistice. It lasted only 

Hungarian a few months and then gave way to a Bolshevist 
Republic regime, which was equally short-lived. After 

much confusion, Hungarian socialists of a moderate type 
succeeded in setting up another republican government at 
Budapest. This still endures, though many Magyars are 
partial to a monarchy. The Allies, however, will not permit 
the restoration of the Hapsburg family in Hungary. 

The outstanding fact as respects Russia since November, 
1917, has been the ability of the Bolsheviki to retain power. 
Bolshevism Their rule is essentially a class dictatorship, since 
in Russia t ne urban proletariat forms only about a tenth of 
Russia's population. The Bolsheviki are perfectly consistent, 
therefore, in opposing the convocation of a national assembly 
to frame a constitution acceptable to the great majority of the 
Russian people. 

The Bolsheviki, for a time, encountered serious opposition 
on the part of Russian liberals and reactionaries, who joined 



Economic Reconstruction 723 

forces to overthrow the Soviet government. The anti-Bols e- 
vist movement found its principal support in South Russia and 
Siberia. During 1919-1920 the "Red" armies 
won victories on every front and reconquered most Bolshevism 
of European Russia, Siberia, and Russian Central in Russia 
Asia. The Bolshevist triumph seems to be due chiefly to the 
fact that the anti-Bolshevists repeated the mistake of the emigres 
during the French Revolution and called in foreign assistance 
from Great Britain, France, Japan, and the United States. 
This action had the effect of arousing the national sentiment of 
the Russian people, who were now ready to follow Lenin and 
Trotsky in repelling the invaders of their country. 

The western Allies have now withdrawn from both European 
and Asiatic Russia, though Japan still keeps some forces in 
Siberia. While adopting a policy of non-inter- The Russian 
vention in Russian affairs, the Allies refuse to situation 
recognize the Soviet government until assured that the Bol- 
sheviki have dropped the methods of barbarism for the methods 
of civilization. Trading relations, however, may soon be re- 
established. Russia, whose economic life has been so disrupted 
by the war and the subsequent activities of the Bolsheviki, 
requires western capital to revive its drooping industries. The 
rest of Europe likewise needs to draw upon the rich natural re- 
sources of Russia for economic reconstruction after the war. 

194. Economic Reconstruction 

The war cast its shadow over almost the entire globe. Noth- 
ing like it had ever happened before. Twenty-seven nations, 
with their colonial dependencies, took up arms, A wor i d 
while five Latin-American countries severed diplo- war 
ma tic relations with Germany. Only seventeen nations re- 
mained neutral. 1 Even neutrals, however, could not escape the 
economic dislocations accompanying a war of such magnitude. 

No exact statement is possible of the number of lives lost in 

1 Spain, Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Albania, Abyssinia, 
Persia, Afghanistan, Mexico, Salvador, Colombia, Venezuela, Chile, Paraguay, 
and Argentina. 



724 The World Settlement 

battle action and as a result of wounds, accidents, or disease. 

Premier Clemenceau, in one of the Allied notes to Germany 

before she signed the treaty, declared that "not 

C* & S M ft 1 1 1 G S 

less than seven million dead lie buried in Europe, 
while more than twenty million others carry upon them the 
evidence of wounds and sufferings." The Allied note to Holland, 
demanding the surrender of the kaiser as the instigator of the 
war, estimated the number killed at ten millions, with three 
times as many more mutilated or shattered in health. These 
figures do not include either the millions of civilians, young 
and old, who perished as the result of pestilence and famine in 
those parts of Europe occupied by the Central Powers, or the 
slaughtered Armenians. Not more than five million lives were 
lost in all the wars from the time of the French Revolution 
to 1914. 

Any figures for the money cost of the struggle must be re- 
garded as merely approximate. Experts of the American War 

Department place the direct expenditure of the 
Money cost r. . . 

belligerent nations at $197,000,000,000, an amount 

which probably exceeds the total wealth of the United States. 
This estimate leaves out all the devastation wrought on the 
western front and in other theaters of the war, all property 
destroyed at sea, the depreciation of capital, and the loss of 
production due to the employment of the world's workers in 
military activities. At least $100,000,000,000 must be added for 
these and other items. The grand total would thus reach about 
$300,000,000,000, exclusive of the expenditures and losses of 
neutral nations. All the wars from the time of the French 
Revolution to 1914 cost not more than $25,000,000,000. 

The war was financed to some extent by increased taxation, 
especially in Great Britain and the United States, but chiefly 
Financing by borrowing. The nations, in the first place, 
the war have issued vast quantities of paper money. Such 

forced loans are easily made on the Continent, where the govern- 
ments control the banks and possess a monopoly of note issue. 
The enormous sums thus put into circulation are a primary 
cause of the rise of prices abroad, increasing several times over 



The League of Nations 725 

the cost of labor and commodities as measured in terms of the 
money unit. One of the financial problems confronting Eu- 
rope is the speedy withdrawal of a large part of these notes 
from circulation. In the second place, the nations have sold 
their bonds, or promises to pay, to all who would buy them. 
The amounts raised are far greater than had been supposed 
possible. The people bought the bonds out of their savings, 
for the war taught lessons of thrift to almost every one and 
made it a patriotic duty for the citizen to save that his country 
might have more to spend. The bonds will be mostly funded 
into long-time obligations running many years before maturity. 

The burdens which our own and future generations must 
carry are shown by the gigantic public debts of the principal 
belligerents. In 1919 Great Britain owed $40,000,- p u bii c 
000,000; France, $35,000,000,000; Italy, $ic,ooo,- debts 
000,000 ; and the United States, $26,000,000,000. Germany at 
the end of 1918 owed $40,000,000,000 and Austria-Hungary, 
$25,000,000,000. What Russia owes and what she intends to 
repay are alike incalculable at the present time. 

The general economic situation has been summed up by the 
Supreme Council in a memorandum as follows: "The process 
of recovery of Europe must necessarily be a slow 
one, which cannot be expedited by short cuts of any 
description. It can be most seriously hampered by the dis- 
location of production, by strikes, lockouts, and interruption 
of work of all kinds. The civilization of Europe has indeed 
been shaken and set back, but it is far from being irretrievably 
ruined by the tremendous struggle through which she has 
passed. The restoration of her vitality now depends on the 
wholehearted cooperation of all her children, who have it in 
their own power to delay or accelerate the process of recon- 
struction." 

195. The League of Nations 

The idea of maintaining peace by international agreements is 
not new. Several great wars have been followed by projects 
for the prevention of future conflicts. After the religious 



726 The World Settlement 

struggles of the sixteenth century in France came the "Grand 
Design" of Henry IV. The development of this plan for a 
Early peace European Confederation or Christian Republic was 
projects frustrated by the assassination of the French king. 

Near the close of the seventeenth century, William Penn wrote 
a prophetic Essay towards the Present and Future Peace of Europe. 
Penn argued that an international Diet or Parliament, obeying 
"the same rules of justice and peace by which parents and 
masters govern their families, magistrates their cities, estates 
their republics, and princes and kings their principalities and 
kingdoms," could abolish warfare between the nations. The 
French revolutionary wars produced Immanuel Kant's Towards 
Perpetual Peace. In this work the great German philosopher 
declared that perpetual peace might be secured by an inter- 
national union of states and that such a union would become 
feasible when autocracies gave way to democracies. 

It was the autocrats, however, who made the first attempt 
at a League of Nations. In 1815, after Europe had been ex- 
The Holy hausted by the struggle against Napoleon, the 
Alliance t sar; Alexander I, joined with Francis I of Austria 

and Frederick William III of Prussia in a so-called Holy Alliance. 
The three rulers pledged themselves "in the name of the Most 
Holy and Indivisible Trinity" to take for their sole guide hence- 
forth "the precepts of jiistice, Christian charity, and peace." 
They further promised to remain united "by the bonds of a 
true and indivisible fraternity," and "on all occasions and in 
all places" to lend each other aid and assistance. Most of the 
other European sovereigns later signed this pledge, conspicuous 
exceptions being the Pope, the Sultan, and George IV, the 
British Prince Regent. Though a praiseworthy attempt to 
apply much-needed principles of morality to international 
relations, the Holy Alliance never had any real importance. 
Most statesmen agreed with Metternich's characterization 
of it as a "loud-sounding nothing." It soon faded into obliv- 
ion, being replaced by the far more practical Concert of Europe. 

The five great powers, Great Britain, France, Prussia, Austria, 
and Russia, who formed the Concert, did not keep peace through- 



The League of Nations 727 

out the nineteenth century. Their conflicting interests and 

especially their nationalistic aspirations more than once led to 

hostilities between them. Nevertheless, the idea ^. 

The 

of a Concert persisted, and from time to time the European 
great powers imposed their will upon the whole of Concert 
Europe. They neutralized Switzerland in 181 5 and Belgium in 
1839. At the Congress of Paris in 1856, which concluded the 
Crimean War, they signed the Declaration of Paris providing 
rules for the conduct of maritime warfare. By the Geneva 
Convention in 1864 they undertook to ameliorate warfare on 
land and organized the International Red Cross, with branches 
in every civilized country. In 1878 the great powers, now in- 
cluding Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, 
and Russia, met in the Congress of Berlin for the settlement of 
the Eastern Question. Nor was the Concert confined to Europe. 
It organized the Congo Free State under international guar- 
antees, neutralized the Suez Canal, cooperated with Japan and 
the United States to suppress the Chinese "Boxers," and held 
the Algeciras Conference to deal with the Moroccan problem. 

The nations also began to resort increasingly to arbitration 
as a means of adjusting differences between them. Great 
Britain and the United States, for instance, international 
arbitrated the Alabama claims after the Civil War arbitration 
and in the same way ended a boundary dispute between British 
Guiana and Venezuela, which threatened for a time to involve 
the two great English-speaking peoples in fratricidal strife. 
During the nineteenth century over two hundred awards were 
made by arbitral courts, and every one was executed. After 
1900 many leading countries concluded treaties with each other, 
pledging themselves to submit to arbitration all controversies 
except those affecting national honor or vital interests (such as 
independence). 

International arbitration received a great impetus at the two 
Hague conferences of 1899 and 1907. The assembled powers 
could not agree to limit armaments, but besides The Hague 
revising the laws of war they set up a permanent conferences 
court of arbitration, to which the nations might resort. Though 



728 



The World Settlement 



international 
league 



without authority to enforce its decrees, the Hague Tribunal 
did settle a number of controversies which in earlier days might 
have led to war. It thus marked a distinct advance toward 
international peace. 

Then came the World War. In her lust for conquest, Ger- 
many abruptly withdrew from the European Concert, rejected 
Th W id ever Y proposal for arbitration or mediation, and, 
War and an after hostilities began, proceeded to violate her 
treaty obligations and all the recognized usages of 
warfare, both by land and sea. The Allies, in 
consequence, became the defenders of international law, as well 
as the champions of nationality and of democracy. Their 

enormous sacrifices during the 
struggle promised to be in 
vain, unless some means could 
be found to preserve the sanc- 
- tity of treaties and prevent 
future aggressive wars. An 
international league began to 
seem, not a Utopian scheme, 
but rather a practical neces- 
sity for the peace and security 
*' of mankind. Such thoughts 
as these were repeatedly ex- 
pressed by responsible states- 
men among the Allies, espe- 
cially by Mr. Lloyd George 
and President Wilson. 
As soon as the Peace Conference opened at Paris, a com- 
mittee representing the Allied and Associated governments 
Formation began work on the various proposals which had 
of the been put forward from time to time for an inter- 

eague national league. The first draft of a constitution 

was modified in various respects, as a result of world-wide dis- 
cussion, and the amended document was then inserted in the 
peace treaty with Germany. The signing of that treaty by the 
Allied and Associated governments, and its subsequent ratifica- 




David Lloyd George 



The League of Nations 



729 



tion set up the League of Nations in active operation. The 
first meeting of the council of the league took place January 16, 
1920, at Paris, and the first meeting of the assembly, on Novem- 
ber 15, 1920, at Geneva. 

The constitution, or covenant, of the League of Nations, is a 
short, simple, and dignified document. The objects of the 
organization are thus stated in the preamble : "The The pre _ 
High Contracting Parties, in order to promote in- amble 
ternational cooperation and to achieve international peace and 
security, by the acceptance of obligations not to resort to war, 
by the prescription of open, 
just, and honorable relations 
between nations, by the firm 
establishment of the under- 
standings of international law 
as the actual rule of conduct 
among governments, and by 
the maintenance of justice and 
a scrupulous respect for all 
treaty obligations in the deal- 
ings of organized peoples with 
one another, agree to this 
Covenant of the League of 
Nations." 

The League of Nations con- 
sists of an assembly in which 
each member has one vote ; a council, made up of representa- 
tives of the principal Allied powers, together with representatives 
of four other members of the league ; and a per- covenant of 
manent secretariat at Geneva, Switzerland. World the league 
peace is to be promoted by an agreement between the nations 
to disarm to the lowest point consistent with national safety. 
The members of the league agree, furthermore, to arbitrate any 
dispute which cannot be settled satisfactorily by diplomacy 
and to carry out in good faith any award that may be rendered. 
Should a member resort to war in disregard of its obligations, it 
shall, ipso Jacto, be deemed to have committed an act of 




Woodrow Wilson 



730 The World Settlement 

aggression toward all other members, who thereupon shall pro- 
ceed to sever trade or financial relations with it and, if neces- 
sary, to use armed force against it. A World Court, consisting 
of eleven eminent jurists of different countries and representing 
diverse races, languages, nationalities, and legal codes, was set 
up in 192 1 to facilitate the peaceful settlement of international 
disputes and gradually by its decisions to establish an inter- 
national system of justice. 

Forty-one nations 1 were represented by delegates at the first 
meeting of the assembly of the league in 1920. Six other 
Membership nations, including Austria and Bulgaria, were ad- 
of the league m i tte( j to t h e i ea gue at this time, and still other 
nations (Latvia, Lithuania, and Esthonia), at the second meet- 
ing of the assembly in 192 1. For the future, any self-govern- 
ing state, dominion, or colony may be enrolled by a two-thirds 
vote of the members, provided it promises faithfully to observe 
international obligations. Germany, Turkey, Russia, Mexico, 
and the United States are the only important countries remain- 
ing outside the League of Nations. 

Studies 

1. On the map between pages 718-719, locate the areas occupied by Lithua- 
nians, Letts, Esthonians, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Ruthenians (Little Russians), 
Slovenians, and Serbo-Croats (Serbs and Croatians). 2. Explain the use in this 
chapter of the expressions: secret diplomacy, self-determination, plebiscite, man- 
date, and internationalization. 3. Compare the Peace Conference at Paris with the 
Congress at Vienna as to membership, purpose, and accomplishment. 4. What 
did Mr. Lloyd George mean by declaring, "This is a war of nationalities"? 
5. Where were plebiscites to determine national allegiance provided for by the Peace 
Conference? 6. On the map between pages 714-715 indicate what territories 
have been "redeemed" by Italy and Rumania, respectively. 7. How has Greece 
profited territorially by her participation in the World War ? 8. How many inde- 
pendent countries were there in Europe in 1914? How many are there now? 
9. Name and locate the capitals of the new European states. 10. What did Presi- 
dent Wilson mean by saying, "The world must be made safe for democracy"? 

11. On the basis of the statements in the text-book, give some account of the origin, 
character, and extinction of the Hapsburg, Hohenzollern, and Romanov dynasties. 

12. Compare the abolition of private warfare toward the close of the Middle Ages 
with the recent movement to abolish public warfare. 

1 Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Union of South Africa, and India are each 
represented in the assembly of the league, as well as the United Kingdom. 



TABLE OF EVENTS AND DATES 

B. C. 
776 First recorded celebration of the Olympian games. Greek chronology 
begins to be precise from this date. 

753 (?) Rome founded. Traditional date. 

606 Destruction of Nineveh. End of the Assyrian Empire, which had long 
dominated the Near East. 

586-539 Captivity of the Hebrews in Babylonia. 

568 (?)-488 (?) Gautama Buddha. 

551 (?)-478 Confucius. 

509 (?) Roman Republic established. Traditional date. 

490 Marathon, 480 Salamis, and 479 Plataea and Mycale. The four battles 
which preserved Greec«, from Persian domination and European 
culture from submergence in that of Asia. 

451-450 Laws of the Twelve Tables published. The basis of all later 
Roman law. 

390 (?) Rome captured by the Gauls. 

338 Battle of Chaeronea. The triumph of the Macedonian Kingdom over 
the disunited city-states of Greece. 

333 Issus and 331 Arbela. The two battles which overthrew the Persian 
Empire and established Macedonian supremacy throughout the 
Near East. 

214 Great Wall of China begun. 

202 Battle of Zama. Ended the Second Punic War and left Rome without 
a rival in the western Mediterranean. 

146 Carthage and Corinth destroyed by the Romans. 

58-50 Conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar. Opened up much of western 
Europe to Graeco-Roman civilization. 

31 Battle of Actium. Ended civil war between Antony and Octavian, leav- 
ing the latter supreme in the Roman state. 

4 (?) Birth of Christ. 

70 a. d. Jerusalem captured and destroyed by the Romans. 

73i 



732 Table of Events and Dates 

135 Dispersion of the Jews. 

212 Edict of Caracalla. Extended Roman citizenship to all free-born men 
in the Roman Empire. 

284 Reorganization of the Roman Empire by Diocletian. The imperial 
system henceforth became an undisguised absolutism of the Oriental 
type. 

313 Edict of Milan. Granted general religious toleration and placed 
Christianity on a legal equality with the other religions of the 
Roman world. 

325 Council of Nicaea. Framed the Nicene Creed, which is still the ac- 
cepted summary of Christian doctrine in Roman Catholic, Greek, 
and most Protestant churches. 

330 Constantinople (New Rome) made the capital of the Roman Empire. 

451 Battle of Chalons. Saved western Europe from being conquered by the 
still barbarous Huns. 

476 Deposition of Romulus Augustulus. Extinction of the line of Roman 
emperors in the West. 

496 Clovis adopted Catholic Christianity. Paved the way for intimate 
relations between the Franks and the Papacy. 

529 (?) Rule of St. Benedict. Established the form of monasticism which 
ultimately prevailed everywhere in western Europe. 

529-534 Codification of Roman law. The Corpus Juris Civilis formed per- 
haps the most important contribution of Rome to civilization. 

622 The Hegira (Flight) of Mohammed from Mecca to Medina. Marks 
the beginning of the Mohammedan era. 

732 Battle of Tours. The victory of the Franks under Charles Martel 
stemmed the farther advance of the Moslems into western Europe. 

800 Charlemagne crowned Emperor of the Romans. Formation of the so- 
called Holy Roman Empire. 

843 Treaty of Verdun and 870 Treaty of Mersen. Marked important 
stages in the dissolution of Charlemagne's dominions. 

962 Otto I, the Great, crowned Roman Emperor. Revival of the so- 
called Holy Roman Empire. 

982 Greenland discovered by the Northmen. 

988 Christianity introduced into Russia. The Russian Slavs henceforth 
came under the influence of the Greek Church and Byzantine civ- 
ilization. 



Table of Events and Dates 733 

1054 Final rupture of the Greek and Roman Churches. Destroyed the 

religious unity of European Christendom. 

1066 Battle of Hastings. Resulted in the Norman Conquest of England. 

1095 Council of Clermont. Beginning of the crusades. 

1 122 Concordat of Worms. A compromise arrangement between the 
Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire. 

1206-1227 Conquests of Jenghiz Khan. Brought a large part of Asia 
and eastern Europe under Mongol sway. 

1215 Magna Carta. Defined the rights of Englishmen and inspired their 
later struggles for political liberty. 

1271-1295 Travels of Marco Polo. Polo's narrative of his travels greatly 
increased the interest of Europeans in the Far East. 

1295 "Model Parliament" of Edward I. A regularly elected Parliament 
which for the first time included representatives of all classes of 
the English people. 

1309-1377 "Babylonian Captivity" of the Papacy. The removal of the 
popes to Avignon weakened their political authority. 

1348-1349 Black Death in Europe. Hastened the decline of serfdom and the 
emancipation of the peasantry. 

1378-1417 The "Great Schism." Weakened the spiritual supremacy of the 
popes over western Christendom. 

1396 Greek first taught at Florence, Italy. The revival of Greek studies in 
western Europe formed an important aspect of the Renaissance 
movement. 

1453 Constantinople captured by the Ottoman Turks. End of the Byzan- 
tine Empire and beginning of the Eastern Question. 

1456 First book printed at Gutenberg's press in Mainz, Germany. 

1487 Cape of Good Hope rounded by Diaz. The final step in the Portuguese 
exploration of the western coast of Africa. 

1492 Discovery of America by Columbus. 

1498 India reached by Vasco da Gama. The Portuguese thus opened up 
an ocean passage from Europe round Africa to the Far East. 

1517 Luther's Ninety-five Theses posted. Beginning of the Protestant 
Reformation in Germany. 

1519-1522 Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe. 



734 Table of Events and Dates 

1543 Publication of Copernicus's treatise "On the Revolutions of Celestial 
Orbits." Resulted in the adoption of an entirely new system of 
astronomy, by which man's outlook on the universe has been 
fundamentally changed. 

1545 Silver Mines of Potosi in Bolivia discovered. The enormous output 

of silver from these mines greatly enlarged the supply of money 

in western Europe, thus stimulating industrial and commercial 
enterprise. 

1545-1563 Council of Trent. An important agency in the Catholic Counter 
Reformation. 

1577-1580 Drake's voyage around the world. 

1588 Defeat of the Spanish Armada. Gave to England control of the sea 
and made possible English colonization of North America. 

1598 Edict of Nantes issued by Henry IV of France. A noteworthy step 
in the direction of religious toleration. 

1607 Settlement of Jamestown. The first permanent English colony in 
America. 

1611 Authorized Version of the Bible published. The translation still in 
ordinary use among Protestants throughout the English-speaking 
world. 

1648 Peace of Westphalia. Ended the religious wars. 

1687 Newton's "Principia" published. One of the most important contri- 
butions ever made to physical science. 

1688-1689 The "Glorious Revolution." Completed the work of the Puritan 
Revolution by overthrowing absolutism and divine right in Eng- 
land. 

1704 Battle of Blenheim. Defeated the attempt of Louis XIV to make 
France supreme in western Europe. 

1762 Rousseau's "Social Contract" published. Its democratic teachings 

were put into effect by the French revolutionists. 

1763 Peace of Paris. Ended the Seven Years' War and gave to England 

a colonial empire in India and North America at the expense of 
France. 

1768-1779 Voyages of Captain James Cook. Greatly increased geographi- 
cal knowledge of the Pacific Ocean and its archipelagoes. 

1769 Arkwright's "water frame," 1770 Hargreaves's "spinning jenny," 
1779 Crompton's "mule," and 1785 Cartwright's power loom. 



Table of Events and Dates 735 

1781-1782 Watt's steam engine patented. The steam engine had previously 
served only for pumping; henceforth it could be applied to manu- 
facturing and transportation. 

1776 Declaration of Independence. 

1783 Peace of Paris and Versailles. Ended the War of the American Revo- 
lution. 

1787 Constitution of the United States framed. 

1789 Meeting of the Estates-General in France. The first step toward 
the French Revolution. 

1803 Louisiana Purchase. Made possible a greater United States. 

1804 The Code Napoleon promulgated. The most lasting memorial 

of the Napoleonic era. 

1807 Fulton's steamboat, the "Clermont," in successful operation. 

1814-1815 Congress of Vienna. Remade the map of Europe after the 
revolutionary and Napoleonic era. 

1815 Battle of Waterloo. Brought about the final overthrow of Napoleon 
Bonaparte. 

1823 Monroe Doctrine enunciated. Has prevented European interference 
in the affairs of the New World. 

1825 Stockton and Darlington Railway opened. The first line over which 

passengers and freight were carried by steam power. 

1826 Independence of the Spanish-American colonies recognized by Spain. 

1830-183 1 The "July Revolution" in Europe. Overthrew absolutism and 
divine right in France and created modern Belgium. 

1832 Reform Act in Great Britain. The first step in democratizing the 

British government. 

1833 Abolition by Great Britain of slavery in the British West Indies. 

1837 Morse's first telegraph instrument exhibited. 

1838 The Atlantic Ocean crossed by the "Great Western." The first 

steamship to make the trip without using sails or recoaling on the 
way. 

1839 Lord Durham's Report. Embodied liberal proposals for colonial self- 

government, which were subsequently adopted by Great Britain 
for Canada and other overseas possessions. 
1848-1849 The "February Revolution" in Europe. Made France again a 
republic and led to revolutionary upheavals in Italy, Germany and 
the Austrian Empire. 



736 Table of Events and Dates 

1851 Crystal Palace Exhibition at London. The first of the great inter- 
national expositions. 

1854 Treaty between Japan and the United States. The first step in break- 
ing down Japan's traditional isolation. 

1858-1861 Russian serfdom abolished by Alexander II. 

1859 Darwin's "Origin of Species" published. Presentation of the 
evolutionary theory, which has so profoundly influenced modern 
science, philosophy, and religion. 

1863 Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. 

1864 International Red Cross Society founded. Has become the greatest 

humanitarian organization in the world. 

1866 Atlantic Cable laid. The first of the many cables which now elec- 
trically bridge all the oceans. 

1869 Suez Canal opened. 

1870 Rome occupied by Italian troops. Unification of Italy completed. 

1871 German Empire proclaimed at Versailles. 

1874 International Postal Union established. An important agency in 

internationalization. 

1875 First telephone patented by A. G. Bell. 

1899 Meeting of the First Hague Peace Conference. 

1900 Trans-Siberian Railway completed from Petrograd to Vladivostok. 

1903 S. P. Langley's airplane and 1908 Wright Brothers' airplane. 

1909 North Pole reached by Robert E. Peary and 191 1 South Pole reached 
by R. Amundsen. 

1912 China becomes a republic. 

1914 Panama Canal opened. 

1914-1918 World War. 

1917 The Russian Revolution and establishment of Bolshevism in Russia. 

1919 Peace Conference at Versailles. 

1920 First meeting of the League of Nations. 
1921. Disarmament Conference at Washington. 



INDEX AND PRONOUNCING 
VOCABULARY 



Note. — The pronunciation of most proper names is indicated either by a simplified 
spelling or by their accentuation and division into syllables. The diacritical marks em- 
ployed are those found in Webster's New International Dictionary and are the following : 



a as in ale. 


a " 


" senate. 


a " 


" care. 


a " 


" am. 


a " 


" account 


a " 


" arm. 


a " 


" ask. 


a " 


" sofd. 


e " 


" eve. 


* " 


" event. 


6 " 


" end- 


e " 


" recent. 


e " 


" maker. 


i " 


" Ice. 


i " 


" ill. 



o as in old 


6 ' 


' " obey. 


6 ' 


" orb. 


o ' 


" odd. 




" soft. 


' 


" connect 


u. " 


" use. 


u ' 


" unite. 


u ' 


" iirn. 


n ' 


"up. 


u ' 


" circMS. 


ii ' 


" menii. 


00 ' 


" food. 


do ' 


" foot. 


ou' 


" out. 



oi as in oil. 


cb " 


" chair. 


g u 

ng" 
•Hi " 


" go. 
" sing. 
" iqk. 
" fben. 


tb " 


" tbin. 


tu " " nature. 

du " " verdure. 

k for ch as in Ger. icb, acb 


n as in Fr. bon. 


y " " yet. 

zb for z as in azure. 



Abdul-Hamid (ab-dool-ha-med'), II, 537, 
65S and note 1. 

Abraham, 183. 

Absentee landlordism in Ireland, 4S6, 487. 

Absolutism, Oriental, 40, 41; Roman, 153, 
154; European, 201, 281, 282, 283, 286, 290, 
291, 293, 294, 296, 312, 347, 362, 415, 516, 
517, 524, 525, 720. 

Abyssinia (ab-i-sin'i-«), 541, 546, 547. 

Acadia. See Nova Scotia. 

Achaean («-ke'an) League, the, 109, 110. 

Achilles (ft-kil'ez), 101, 102. 

Acre (a'ker), 189. 

A-crop'o-lis of Athens, the, 93. 

Actium (ak'shi-Min), naval battle of, 138. 

Act of Settlement, the, 294, 468. 

Act of .Supremacy, the, 262. 

Act of Union, the, 479, note 1. 

Aden (a'd<*n), 492. 

A-dri-at'ic Sea, 69. 

jEgean (e-ju'ffn) Sea, 69, 70. 

xEgeans, the, 71-73. 

iE-o'li-a, 74. 

.(E'o-lis, 74. 

jE-to'li-an League, the, 109, 110. 

Af-ghan-i-stan', 104, 552, 553. 655. 

Africa, geography and peoples of, 542; ex- 
ploration of, 543-546 ; partitioned, 546-550. 

" Agadir (iig-a-der') incident," the, 657. 

Ag-a-mem'non, 75. 



Agriculture, Oriental, 44; Roman, 118,131, 

144; medieval, 215, 216; modern, 605, 606. 
Ah'ri-man, 54. 

Ahuramazda (a-hoo-ra-maz'da), 54. 
"Aids," feudal, 171. 
Airplane, the, 596. 
Airship, the, 596, 597. 
Aisne(an) River, 675. 
Aix-la-Chapelle (aks-la-sha-pel'), Peace of, 

313, 327. 

Ajaccio (a-yat'cho), 387. 
Alabama claims, the, 727. 
Al-a-man'ni, the, 161. 
Aland Islands, 718. 
Alaska, 344, 573, 574, 577. 
Albania, 539, 661, 6S8, 716. 
Albanians, the, 530. 
Albert I, king of Belgium, 672, 673. 
Alberta, 56S. 
Aleppo, 659, 703. 
Alexander I, king of Greece, 684. 
Alexander I, king of Jugoslavia, 716. 
Alexander I, tsar of Russia, 396, 402, 413, 

417, 429, 522, 525, 527, 531, 726; II, 462, 

526-52S. Oils; III, 528. 
Alexander VI, pope, 252. 
Alexander the Great, 101-105, 126. 
Al-ex-an'dri-a, 103, 100, 10S, 109, 138, 141, 

148, 189, 231, 339, 550. 
Alfonso XIII, king of Spain, 508. 



737 



738 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Algeciras (Span. pron. al-M-the'ras) Con- 
ference, the, 657, 727. 

Algeria, 503, 504, 547, 657. 

Al-ham'bra, the, 185. 

Allah (al'd), 180. 

Alphabet, the, 25, 26 and note 1, 114, 305, 
522. 

Alpine racial type, the, 67. 

Alps Mountains, 66. 

Alsace (al-sas'), 277, 297, 299, 407, 465, 466, 
513, 516, 651, 686, 705, 711. See also 
Lorraine. 

Amendments to the American Constitution, 
341, 342, 631, 633, 638. 

Am-en-ho'tep IV, Egyptian king, 53, 54. 

America, the Northmen in, 167 ; discovered 
by Columbus, 252 ; Spanish explorations 
in, 254 ; the Spanish colonial empire, 254, 
255 ; the Old World and the New, 255-257 ; 
Dutch settlements in, 323, 324, 328 ; Eng- 
lish and French colonization of, 328-331 ; 
rivalry of Prance and England in, 331-334 ; 
revolt of the Thirteen Colonies, 334-341; 
formation of the United States, 341, 342 ; 
British North, 566-568; Latin, 568-573; 
the United States, 573-576. 

American Revolution, the, 334-341, 407. 

Amiens (a-myaN'), Peace of, 391, 395. 

Am-phic'ty-o-nies, 80. 

Amsterdam, 255, 298. 

Amundsen (a'miin-sen), Captain Eoald, 577, 
note 1, 578. 

Amur (a'inoor) Valley, 551, 558. 

A-nam', 552. 

An-a-tol'i-a, 714. 

Ancestor worship, Roman, 116, 117 ; Chinese, 
557. . 

Anglicanism, 262, 263, 264, 265, 282, 283, 284, 
288, 291, 293, 352, 4S5, 488, 635, 639. 

Anglo-Russian Convention, the, 552, 655. 

An v gl°-Sax'ons, the, 160, 168, 238. 

An-go'la, 547. 

Animals, domestication of, 14, 44 ; worship 
of, 52 ; crueltv to, 630, 631. 

Anne, Queen, 293, 294, 300, 480. 

Antarctic exploration, 578. 

Anthony, Susan B., 633. 

Anthropology, 645. 

An-tig'o-nids, the, 105, note 2, 

Antioch (anti-6k), 106, 231. 

Antiquity of man, 5, 642. 

Anti-Saloon League, the, 631. 

Antony, 138. 

Antwerp, 255, 428. 

Ap'en-nine Mountains, 112. 

A-pol'lo, 76, 77, 80, 90. 

Ap'pi-an Way, the, 123. 

Aqueducts, Roman, 147. 

Arabia, physical features of, 180. 

Arabs, the, 22, 161, 180, 182, 184, 186, 687, 
715. 

Aragon (a-ra-gdn'), 200. 

Ar-a-mae'ans, the, 34. 

Ar-be'la, battle of, 103. 

Arbitration, international, 727, 728, 729. 

Arc de Triomphe (ark de tre-oNf), the, 422. 

Arch, the, 60, 114, 232, 233, 243. 

A rchangel, 306. 

Archbishop of Canterbury, the, 208. 

Architecture, Oriental, 56, 57 ; Greek, 93 ; 
Byzantine, 178 ; Romanesque and Gothic, 
during the Middle Ages, 231-233 ; Renais- 
sance, 243, 244, 246 ; modern, 648. 



Arctic exploration, 577, 578. 
Argentina, 508, 571. 
Argonne (ar-gon'), the, 676. 
Ar'gos, 79, 81. 

Aristotle (ar'is-totT), 101, 247. 
Arkwright, Richard, 585, 587, 589. 
"Armada (ar-ma'dd) Invincible," the, 273 
and note 1, 328. 
"Armed peace," 661. 
Armenia, 30, 139, 719. 
Armies, modern, 662, 663. j 

Armistice with Germany, 704, 705. 
Arno River, 122. 
Arras (a-ras'), 701, 702. 
Art, Palaeolithic, 11; Oriental, 56-58; 
Mgenn, 72 ; Greek, 93 ; Byzantine, 177, 
178; Arab, 186; medieval, 231-233; Ren- 
aissance, 243, 244, 246; modern, 648, 649. 
See also Architecture, Painting, Sculpture. 
Ar-ta-pher'nes, 87. 

Articles of Confederation, the, 341, 510. 
Artisans, Oriental, 42 ; Athenian, 92 ; Ro- 
man, 144; medieval, 226-228; modern, 
350, 582, 589, 591, 609-614. 
Artois (ar-twa'), 297. 
Artois, Count of, 379 and note 2, 424. 
Aryan (ar'ydSn) languages, 22, note 1. 
Ashley, Lord. See Shaftesbury, Earl of. 
Asia, divisions of, 29, 30 ; medieval explora- 
tions in, 248, 249 ; opening up and partition 
of, 550-553. 
Asia Minor, 71, 74, 659, 714. 
Asquith, H. H., 488, 674. 
Assignais (a-se-nya'), the, 377, 378. 
Assuan (as-swan') Dam, the, 549. 
As'sur, 36. 

As-syr'i-a, 36, 37. I 

Astrolabe, the, 249. 
Astrology, Babylonian, 53. 
Astronomy, Oriental, 59 ; Renaissance, 247 ; 
eighteenth-century, 356 ; modern, 641, 644. 
A-the'na, 76, 93. 

Athens, population of, 79 and note 1 ; polit- 
ical development of, 81, 82 ; in the Persian 
wars, 85, 87, 88, 89 ; ascendancy of, 89-93 ; 
Athenian culture, 93-97 ; rivalry of, with 
Sparta, 97 ; defeated by Philip II, 99, 100. 
Athletics, Greek, 77, 78. 
A'thos, Mount, 86, 88. 
At-lan'tis, myth of, 251. 
At'ti-ca, 79, note 1, 89, 92. 
At'ti-la the Hun, 191, 192. 
Augsburg (ouks'bdorK), Peace of, 269, 275, 
636. 
Au-gus'tus, Roman emperor, 138, 139, 140, 

142, 147. 
Augustus, the title, 138. 
Ausgleieh (ous'gliK), the Austro-Hungarian, 
519 520 

Austerlitz (ous'ter-llts), battle of, 396, 397, 
398, 444. 

Australia, exploration of, 343 ; settlement 
of, 565, 566 ; the Australian Commonwealth, 
566 ; in the World War, 686, 712. 
Australian ballot, the, 477 and note 1. 
Australian Commonwealth. See Australia. 
Austria, under Maria Theresa, 309, 310 ; 
under Joseph II, 363, 364; wars of, with 
France, during the revolutionary and Napo- 
leonic era, 382, 3S5, 388, 389, 390, 391, 396, 
398, 401, 403 ; territorial acquisitions of, by 
the Vienna settlement, 416; under Metter- 
nich, 419, 423, 427, 430, 431, 435 ; revolt of 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 739 



Bohemia and Hungary against, 436, 437 ; 
at war with Sardinia, 437, 452, 453 ; loss of 
Lombardy and Venetia by, 453, 456, 462 ; 
eliminated from German aifairs, 463 ; union 
of, with Hungary, 519 ; new republic of, 
722. See also Austria-Hungary. 

Austria-Hungary, government of, 519, 520 ; 
nationalities in, 520 ; between 1871 and 1914, 
536, 651, 652, 653, 659, 660, 661, 667; in the 
World War, 669-671, 674, 675, 680, 682, 6S3, 
6S5, 686, 693, 704, 713. 

Austrian Succession, War of the, 313, 327, 
332 

Austro-Prussian War, the, 456, 463, 651. 

Austro-Sardinian War, the, 452, 453. 

Automobile, the, 595, 596. 

Azerbaijan (a-zer-bi-jsin'), 719. 

Azores ((';-z6rz') Islands, 252, 509. 

Aztecs, the, 254. 

Baber (Wber), 325. 

Bab'y-lon, 30, 34, 103, 104. 

Bab'y-lo'ni-a, a seat of early civilization, 30 ; 
city-states of, 33, 34 ; under Nebuchad- 
nezzar, 37 ; conquered by Persia, 38. 

Bacon (Lord), 247. 

Bacteria, 644. 

Baden (ba'dun), 398. 

Bagdad (biig-dad'), 186, 187, 231, 659, 687, 
703. 

Baker, Sir Samuel, 544. 

Balance of power, the, in Europe, 278, 418, 
466, 650, 655. 

Balboa (bal-bo'ti), Vasco Nuflez de, 254. 

Bal-e-ar'ic Islands, 124. 

Balkan peninsula, physical features, 529; 
peoples of, 530. 

Balkan Wars (1912-1913), the, 537, 660, 661, 
6S2. 

Ballot Act, the, 477. 

Baltic (Nordic) racial type, the, 66, 67, 73, 
114, 15S. 

Banking, Oriental, 45, 46 ; modern, 602. 

Bank of France, the, 392, 414. 

Ban'nock-burn, battle of, 197. 

Baptism, sacrament of, 203, 204, 265, 352. 

Baptists, the, 291, 352, 639. 

" Barbarians," defined, 84 and note 4. 

Barred zone, German, 689, 691. 

Basel (ba'zel), Treaty of, 386. 

Ba-sil'i-cas, Roman, 204. 

Bastille (bas-tel'), the, capture of, 374, 375. 

Batavia, 323, 343. 

Batavian Republic, the, 386, 397. 

Bavaria, 398, 418, 514. 

Bayeux (bii-yu') Tapestry, the, 168. 

Bazaine (ba-zen'), General, 464. 

Beaconsfield, Lord. See Disraeli, Benjamin. 

Beauharnais (bo-ar-ne'), Eugene de, 397. 

Bec-ca-ri'a, Marquis di, 629. 

Bech-u-an'a-Iand, 549, 550. 

Bed'ou-ins, the, 180, 182. 

Beethoven (bii'to-v<?n), Ludwig van, 647. 

Behaim (ba'uim), Martin, globe of, 250. 

Belfort (bel-for'), 673. 

Belgian Congo, the, 510, 547, 727. 

Belgium, 270, 279, 416, 426-428, 509, 510, 631, 
633, 672-674, 675, 676, 679, 680, 686, 690, 705, 
712, 727. 

Bel-grade', 716. 

Bell, Alexander G., 598. 

Belleau (bSl-16') Woods, 702. 

Benedict XV, pope, 507, 695, 697. 



Benedictine Rule, the, 208-210. 

Bengal (bun-g61'), 327. 

Benjamin, Hebrew tribe, 35. 

Berchtold, Count, 671. 

Bering, Vitus, 344, 573. 

Berlin, 314, 396, 704. 

Berlin Decree, 399 ; Treaty, 536, 651, 653, 660, 

727. 

Berlin-to-Bagdad Railway, the, 659, 660. 
Bes-sa-ra'bi-a, 417, 522, 531. 
Bethmann-Hollweg(bat'man-hol'viiK), Theo- 
bald von, 672, 673, 674, 691. 
Bible, the, 59, 109, 150, 245, 260, 261, 263, 264, 

268. 

Bill of Rights, the, 293, 294, 379, 468. 
Bimetallism, 602. 
Biology, 357, 641, 643, 644. 
Bismarck, Otto von, 460-466, 516, 517, 519, 

536, 613, 619, 650, 651, 652, 653. 654, 655, 

658, 712. 
Black Death, the, 220. 
" Black Hole" of Calcutta, the, 327 
Black Race, 17, 20, 21, 542. 
Black Sea, the, 83, 308, 714. 
Blanc (bliiN), Louis, 618. 
Blenheim (blen'im), battle of, 300. 
Blucher (blu'Ker), 404, 405. 
Bceotia, (be-o'shi-«), 89, 100. 
Boers (boors), the, 323, 548, 549, 654, 686. 
Bohemia, 431, 436, 519, 716. 
Boleyn (bool'in), Anne, 262, 263. 
Bolivar (Span. pron. bo-le'var), Sim6n de, 

569, 570. 

Bolivia, 255, 569. 

Bologna (bo-lon'yii), university of, 235, 236. 
Bol-she-vi-ki', the, in Russia, 699 and note 1, 

700, 716, 717, 718, 719, 722, 723. 
Bom-bay', 325. 

Bonapartists, the, in France, 432. 
Book of Common Prayer, the, 262, 284, 

285, 2S8, 291. 
Book of the Dead, Egyptian, 49, 55. 
Books, hand-written, 26 ; printed, 242, 243. 
Booth, William, 631. 
Bordeaux (b6r-do'), 255. 
Bor'ne-o, 493, 564. 
Bor-o-di'no, battle of, 402. 
Borussi, the, 311. 
Bosnia, 536, 651, 660, 669, 715.. 
Bos'po-rus, the, 714. 
" Boston Tea Party," the, 537. 
Boulogne (boo-lon'y) , 395, 396. 
Bourbon (boor'biin), dynasty, the, 275, 404, 

414, 425, note 1. 
Bourgeoisie (bSor-zhwS.-ze'), the, 222, 223, 

346, 366, 381, 387, 472, 619, 698, 699, 720, 721. 
"Boxers," the. 559, 656, 727. 
Boyne River, the, battle of, 485. 
Braganza (brsi-gan'zd) dynasty, the, 509. 
Brahma (bra'm/z), 554. 
Brahmanism, 554. 
Brandenburg (briin'd^n-bdorK), 277, 279, 302, 

311,312. See also Prussia. 
Brazil, 252, note 1, 254, 400, 50S, 509, 570, 

571, 628, 638. 

Bremen (brti'm^n), city, 222 ; bishopric, 277. 
Brest-Litovsk (brost'l'ye-tofsk'), Treaty of, 

700. 

Brin'di-si, 123. 
Britain, conquest and Romanization of, 139. 

See also England. 
British Columbia, 568. 
British Empire, the, 490, 492-494, 496, 540. 



74Q Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



British Isles, the, 197. 

Brittany, 196, 199. 

Bronze, 15, 47, 71, 75, 114, 158. 

Bruges (bruzh), 224, 231, 255. 

Brunswick, 430. 

Brusilov, General, 682, 683. . 

Brussels, 426, 675. 

Budapest (bo6'da-pest), 520. 

Buddha (bo"6'da), Gautama, 554. 

Buddhism, 554, 555, 557, 561, 640. 

Bukharest (boo-ka-resf), Treaty of, 538, 

539, 661. 

Bukowina (boo-ko-ve'na), 682, 713. 
Bulgaria, 192, 535, 536, 537, 538, 539, 682, 683, 

693, 703, 714. 

Bulgarians, the, 18, 179, 192, 530. 
" Bulls," papal, 212 and note 2. 
Bundesrat (bo"6n'des-rat), the, 513, 514, 515, 

721. 

Bureaucracy, French, 503. 
Bur-gun'di-ans, the, 159, 160, 161, 199. 
'Bur'gun-dy, 199. 
Burke, Edmund, 336, 496. 
Burma, 249, 552, 554, 555, 558. 
Bushmen, the, 542. 
Byzantine Empire, the, 176— ISO. 
Byzantium (bi-zan'shi-nm), 83, 154. See 

also Constantinople. 

Cabinet system, the, 342, 411, 412, 483, 484, 

722. 

Cabot, John, 328. 
Cadiz (ka'dez), 48, 255, 273. 
Csesar (se'zarl, Gaius Julius, 136-138, 198, 

549 

Cairo (kT'ro), 31, 1S6, 189, 231, 550. 
Calais (Fr. pron. ka-le'), 676. 
Calculus, infinitesimal, 356. 
Calcutta, 325, 327. 
Calendar, the, 59. 
Cal'i-cut, 251. 
California, 254. 
Caliph (ka'lif), the title, 184. 
Caliphate, the, dismemberment of, 186. 
Calvin. John, 261, 274, 282. 
Calvinism, 261, 262, 265, 270, 274, 275, 276, 

2S2. 

Cam'ba-luc. See Peking. 
Cam-bo'di-a, 5j>2. 
Cambridge, university of, 235. 
Cam-by'ses, Persian king, 38, 84. 
Cameroons, the, 547, 6S6, 712. 
Cam-pa'ni-a, 114, 122. 
Cam'po For'mi-o, Treaty of, 389, 391, 396, 

457. 

Cam 'pus Mar'ti-us, 117. 
Canada, French settlement of, 330 ; acquired 

by England, 333; the "Tories" in, 338. 

566; in the War of 1812-1S14, 567; the 

Dominion of, 567, 568 ; in the "World War, 

688. 
Canal-building, era of, 593. 
Can'nfe, battle of, 126. 
Canning, George, 423. 
Ca-no'va, Antonio, 648. 
Cantignv, 702. 
Can -ton', 558. 
Cape Colony, 416, 546. 
Cape Town, 323, 548, 549. 
Cape-to-Cairo Railway, the. 549, 550. 
Cape of Good Hope, 251, 323, 544, 548. 
Capet (Fr. pron. ka-pc'), Hugh, 199, 237, 

376. 



Capetian (k^-pe'shan) dynasty, the, 199. 

Capital punishment, 629. 

Cap'i-to-line Mount, 121. 

Cap'u-a, 123. 

Car-a-cal'la, Roman emperor, 140. 

Car-bo-na'H, the, 449. 

Cardinalate, the, 212, 213. 

Carnegie (kar-neg'i), Andrew, 636. 

Car-ni-o'la, 716. 

Carnot (kar-no'), Lazare, 385, 388. 

Car-pa'thi-an Mountains, 191. 

Car'thage, a Phtenician colony, 48, 123, 124 ; 

civilization of, 124 ; wars of, with Borne, 

124-127 ; destroyed, 127. 
Cartier (kar-tyii'), Jacques, 329. 
Cartwright, Edward, 587, 589. 
Castes, Hindu, 555. 

Castile (kas-tel'), kingdom of, 199, 200. 
Castles, feudal, 172-174. 
Catacombs, the, at Rome, 150. 
Ca-thay'. See China. 
Cathedrals, medieval, 231-233. 
Catherine of Aragon, 262. 
Catherine II, tsarina of Russia, 307-309, 317, 

318, 362, 363, 522, 525, 531. 
Catholic Church. See Greek Church, Roman 

Church. 
Caucasia, 524, 719. 

Caucasian Race, the. See White Race. 
" Cavaliers," the, 286 and note 1, 292. 
Cave dwellers, the, 10, 11. 
Cavour (ka-voor'), Camillo di, 451-455, 466, 

507, 534. 

Celebes (sel'e-bez), 323. 
Celtic languages, 196, 197, 198. 
Censorship of the press, 272, 353, 368, 394, 

408. 

Central American Federation, the, 572. 
Ceres (se'rez), 118. 
Cervantes (ser-van'tez), 246. 
Ceylon, 249, 253, 254, 416, 493, 555. 
Chasronea (ker-6-ne'u), battle of, 100. 
Chalons (sha-lou'). battle of, 192. 
Chalcidice (kal-sid'i-se), peninsula of, 99. 
Chamber of Deputies, French, 499, 501, 504, 

514. 

Cham plain (sham-plan'), Samuel de, 330. 
Chancellor, German, 514. 
Channel Islands, the, 490. 
Charity, Roman, 148 ; medieval, 206, 210 ; 

modern, 631, 632. 
Charlemagne (shar'le-man), 161-164, 169, 

269, 393, 398. 

Charles I, emperor of Austria, 521, 704. 
Charles I, king of England, 284-289, 328; 

II, 291, 292, 328, 329, 601. 
Charles I, king of Rumania, 159. 
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, 253, 259, 

262, 268, 266, 269, 270 ; VI, 310. 
Charles X, king of France, 424, 425. 
Charles Albert, king of Sardinia, 437, 505. 
Charles the Bald, 164. 
Chartism, 473, 474. 

Chateau-Thierry (sha-to'-tye-re'), 702. 
Chatham (chat'am), Earl of, See William 

Pitt. 
Chaucer, Geoffrey, 238. 
Chemistry, 357, 641, 643. 
Cherbourg (sher-boor'), 255. 
Child labor, regulation of, 611, 612, 613. 
Children, emancipation of, 63. 
Chile, 571. 
China, in antiquity, 29 ; visited by the Polos, 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 741 



248, 249 ; geography and people of, 555, 
556 ; civilization of, 556, 557 ; during the 
nineteenth and twentieth centuries, 557- 
560, 656, 695, 712. 

Chino-Japanese War, the, 55S, 562, 687. 

Chivalry, 175, 176. 

Christianity, rise and spread of, 149, 150 ; 
persecuted, 150, 151 ; triumph of, 151 ; in- 
fluence of, on Roman society, 151, 153 ; 
adopted by the Germans, 159, 160, 161 ; 
separation of the Greek and Roman 
churches, 179 ; in western Europe, during 
the Middle Ages, 203-213 ; the Reformation, 
257-265 ; the Catholic Counter Reforma- 
tion, 266-269 ; the religious wars, 269-278 ; 
during the eighteenth century, 351-354 ; 
modern, 636, 63S-641. See also Greek 
Church, Protestants, Roman Church. 

Church and State, separation of, 638, 639. 

Church of England. See Anglicanism. 

Cicero (sis'e-ro), Marcus Tullius, 137. 

Ci-pan'go. See Japan. 

Circumnavigation of the globe, Magellan's, 
252 253 

Cisalpine Republic, the, 389, 397. 

Cities, Greek, 79 ; Hellenistic, 105, 106 ; Ro- 
man, 141, 142 ; medieval, 221-225. 

Citizenship, in the Greek city-state, 79 ; at 
Athens, 92 ; Roman, 122, 129, 134, 135. 

City-state, the, Oriental, 32, 33, 34; Greek, 
79-82 ; Roman, 119-121. 

Civilization, nature of, 1, 2 ; Oriental, 40-63 ; 
^Egean, 71-73; Athenian, 93-97; Hellen- 
istic, 105-110; Arabian, 1S6 ; medieval, 203- 
239 ; modern, 625-649. 

Claudius, Roman emperor, 139. 

Clemenceau (klii-maN-so'), Georges, 707, 709, 
724. 

Cle-o-pa'tra, 138. 

Clergy, medieval, 207, 211 ; in eighteenth- 
century Europe, 347, 348, 353. 

Clermont, the, 593. 

Clive, Robert, 327, 553. 

Clo-til'da, 161. 

Clovis, king of the Franks, 161. 

Coal, 588. 

Coblenz (ko'blents), 705. 

Cochin-China (ko'ehin-chl'na), 249, 552. 

Code Napoleon, the, 391, 414, 448, 634. 

Creur (kur), Jacques, 223. 

Coinage, originof, 45. 

Coligny (ko-len'ye), Admiral de, 329. 

Cologne (ko-lon f ), 705. 

Colombia, 569, 570, 576. 

Colonial policv, Portuguese, 254 ; Spanish, 
254, 255, 569 ;' French, 331, 504 ; British, 334, 
335, 340, 494, 567 ; Italian, 547 ; American, 
564 ; Dutch, 565. 

Colonies and dependencies, Portuguese, 253, 
254, 509, 547; Spanish, 254, 255, 508, 509, 
546, 547, 56S-570 ; Dutch, 322-324, 564, 565, 
572; British, 32S, 329, 333-341, 492-494, 
496, 540, 547-550, 552, 553, 565-568, 572; 
French, 329-333, 503. 504, 540, 547, 552, 565, 
657; Italian, 507, 508, 547; Belgian, 510, 
547; German, 547, 565, 656, 686, 687, 712. 
Colonization, Phoenician, 48 ; Greek, 82-84, 
114; European, 253-255, 320-324, 328-331, 
540-566. 

Columbus, Christopher, 251-252. 
Combination Acts, the, 609. 
Commerce, Oriental, 46-48; yEgean, 
Athenian, 93 ; Hellenistic, 106, 108 ; Roman, 



142, 143 ; Byzantine, 177 ; influence of the 

crusades on, 189, 190 ; medieval, 229-231 ; 

modern, 600. 
Commercial routes, 46, 47, 143, 231, 255. 
Committee of Public Safety, French, 385, 386. 
Common Law, the, 201, 292, 479, 485. 
Commons, House of, 282, 284, 286, 288, 289, 

290, 469-472, 477, 478, 481, 4S2-484, 514, 
Commonwealth, the, in England, 289, 290. 
"Communards," the, 499. 
Commune of Paris, the, 375, 383, 49S, 499. 
Companies, trading, 321, 322 ; chartered 

493. 

Compass, mariner's, 249. 
Comte (koNt), Auguste, 645. 
Concert of Europe, the, 420, 421, 424, 508, 

509, 726, 727. 
Concordat, the French, 392 and note 1, 414, 

639. 
Confederation of the Rhine, 398, 399. 
Confucius (kon-fu/shl-ws), 557. 
Congo Free State, See Belgian Congo. 
Congo River, 546. 
Congregationalism, 265, note 1, 288 and note 

2, 291. 

Conscription, military, 385, 460, 662, 663, 694. 
Conservative Party, British, 473, 476, 477, 

478, 485, 487, 653. 
Constantine (kon'stan-tin) the Great, 151, 

154. 

Constantine I, king of Greece, 659, 682, 684. 
Constantinople, 154, 177-180, 184, 187, 194, 

242, 397, 532, 534, 535, 683, 714. 
Constitutional Democratic Party, Russian, 

698, 699. 
Constitutions : American, 110, 294, 341, 342, 

360, 379, 412, 709; French, 378, 379, 380, 

383, 387, 390, 407, 412, 414, 424, 434, 499 ; 

Spanish, 414, 421, 508; German, 430, 513, 

721, 722; Prussian, 489, 516; British, 479 ; 

Italian, 505 ; Portuguese, 509 ; Belgian, 509 ; 

Swiss, 510 ; Dutch, 511 ; Austro-Hungarian, 

519; Turkish, 537; Japanese, 562. 
Consulate, Napoleon's, 390-393. 
Consuls, Roman, 119, 120, 121. 
Continental Congress, First, 337 ; Second, 

337, 338, 341. 
Continental System, Napoleon's, 398-400, 

402, 567. 

Cook, Captain James, 343, 344, 565, 578 
Cooperative societies, 610. 
Co-per'ni-cus, 247. 

Copper and bronze, introduction of, 15, 71. 
Cor'do-va, 186. 
Corinth, 79, 81, 84, 100, 128. 
Corn Laws, the, repeal of, 604, 605. 
Cornwallis, Lord, 338. 
Coronado (Span. pron. ko-ro-na'tho), 254. 
Coronation Chair, the, 196. 

Cor'pus Ju'ris Ci-vi'lis, the, 145, 146. 

Corsica, 124, 125, 367, 387. 

Cortes (Span. pron. kor-tas'), Hernando, 254. 

Corvee (kor-va'), the, 351. 

Cosmopolitanism. See Internationalism 

Cossacks, the, 305, 403, 700, 719. 

Costa Rica, 572, 707. 

Costume, modern, 625, 626. 

Cotton gin, Whitney's, 5S6, 587. 

Councils, Church : Nicasa, 151 ; Trent, 267, 

268; Vatican, 26S, note 1. 
Counter Reformation, the Catholic, 266-269. 

Coitp d'etat (koo-da-ta'), Napoleon Bona- 
parte's, 390 ; Louis Napoleon's, 444, 445. 



742 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Courland, 686, 700, 718. 

Covenant of the League of Nations, the, 709, 

729, 730. 

Covenanters, Scotch, 285. 
Cracow (kra'ko), 315. 
Cranmer, Archbishop, 262, 263. 
Crassus, 136, 137. 
Cretans, the, 26, 62, 71-73. 
Crete, 71, 72, 533. 
Crimea, the, 308, 531, 534. 
Crimean War, the, 447, 451, 526, 533, 534, 

653, 727. 
Crises, commercial, 603, 604, 664. 
Croatia-Slavonia, 519, 715. 
Cro-Magnon (kro-ma-nyoN'), man, 7. 
Crompton, Samuel, 585, 586, 589. 
Cromwell, Oliver, 287-290, 485. 
Crown colonies, British, 493. 
Crusades, the, 187-190, 230, 234. 
Cuba, 50S, 572, 695. 
Cumse (ku/me), 83. 

Cu-ne'i-form writing, 25 and note 1, 26. 
Curie (ku-re'), Pierre and Marie, 643. 
Cyprus (sl'prtfs), 15, 189, 492, 533, 536. 
Cy-re-na'i-ca, 508. 
Cyrene (si-re'ne), 84, 124. 
Cy'rus the Great, 38, 84. 
Czecho-Slovakia, 713, 716, 717. 
Czechs (cheks), the, 716. 

Dacia (da'shi-a), 139. 

Daimios (di'myoz), Japanese, 561, 562. 

Dal-ma'ti-a, 685, 715. 

Da-mas'cus, 34, 189, 231, 703. 

Danes, the, 168, 238. 

Dante Alighieri (dan'tii a-le-gya're), 241. 

Dantou (daN-tr>N'), Georges Jacques, 381, 
383, 384, 385, 386, 635. 

Danube River, 85, 535. 

Danzig (dan'tsiK), 712. 

Dar-da-nelles', the, 683, 684, 714. 

Da-ri'us I, the Great, 38, 39, 85, 86, 87, 162 ; 
III, 102, 103, 104. 

Darwin, Charles, 642, 643. 

Das Kapital, Marx's, 619 and note 1 

Da'tis, 87. 

David, Hebrew king, 35. 

Declaration of Independence, the, 337, 338, 
340, 359, 581. 

Declaration of Paris, the, 727. 

Declaration of the Eights of Man, the, 378, 
379, 638. 

Deists, the, 358, 359. 

Delhi (del'e), 553. 

De'li-an League, the, 90, 92, 93. 

De'los, 70, 80, 90. 

Delphi (del'fi), 77, 78, 80. 

Delphic Amphictyony, the, 80. 

Delta of the Nile, 31. 

Demarcation, papal line of, 252 and note 1. 

Democracy, absence of, in the Orient, 40 ; 
Greek, 81 ; at Athens, 82, 90-92 ; the Roman 
Church and, 207 ; the Dutch as pioneers of, 
272 ; modern, 410-412 ; disregard of, by the 
Congress of Vienna, 413, 414, 418 ; between 
1815 and 1871, 419, 421, 424, 431, 432, 434, 
435, 436, 439 ; between 1871 and 1914, 467, 
479, 510, 511, 516, 525, 537; imperialism and, 
542 ; the Industrial Revolution and, 581, 
582 ; the World War and, 693, 719, 720. 

De-mos'the-nes, 100, 101. 

Denmark, 166, 261, 265, 279, 398, 417, 462, 512, 
513, 573, 628, 633, 710, 712. 



Dipartements, French, 377, 391, 503. 

De Soto, Hernando, 254. 

Diaz (de'ats), Armando, 704. 

Diaz (de'ath), Porfirio, 572. 

Dickens, Charles, 646. 

Dictator, the Roman, 119. 

Diocletian (di-o-kle'shan), 153, 154. 

Dionysus (dI-6-ni's<is), 94. 

Directory, French, 387, 388, 389, 390. 

Disarmament, movement for international, 
664, 665 ; of the Central Powers, after the 
World War, 713, 714. 

Disestablishment, religious, 488, 639. 

Disraeli (diz-ra'H), Benjamin, 476,477, 653. 

Dissenters, the, 291 and note 1, 294, 353. 

Divination, Babylonian, 53, 114. 

Divine right of kings, the, 2S1, 2S2, 284, 292, 
294, 311, 516, 517, 720. See also Absolu- 
tism. 

Division of labor, the, 591. 

Divorce, 116, 147, 205, 633, 634. 

Dodecanese Islands, 714. 

Do-do'na, 77, 78. 

Dolmens, 13, 14. 

Domestication of animals and plants, 14, 44. 

Domestic system, the, 589. 

Dominicans, the, 210, 211. 

Dom Pedro II, 570. 

Don Quixote (Span. pron. don ke-ho'ta), 
Cervantes', 246. 

Do'ris, 74. 

Drake, Sir Francis, 272, 273, 343. 

Drama, ancient Athenian, 94; modern, 646. 

Dravidians, the, 554. 

Dual Alliance, the, 653, 655. 

Dual Monarchy, the. See Austria-Hungary. 

Dublin, 197. 489. 

Duma, the, 529, 698. 

Dunkirk, 676. 

Dupleix (dij^pleks'), 325-327. 

Durazzo (doo-rat'so), 660. 

Durham (diir'am), Lord, Report of, 567, 
568. 

Dushan, Stephen, 532. 

Eastern Question, the, 309, 451- 533, 584, 536, 
539, 658, 727. 

Eastern Rumelia, 536. 

East Goths. See Ostrogoths. 

East India Company, Dutch, 323, 343, 565 ; 
French, 325 ; English, 325, 553. 

Ebert (a'bert), Friedrich, 721. 

Economics, science of, 354, 355. 

Ecuador, 569, 570. 

Edict of Milan, 151. 

Edison, Thomas A., 589. 

Education, Oriental, 60, 62 ; Greek, 95 ; un- 
der Charlemagne, 163 ; Byzantine, 178, 179 ; 
in western Europe, during the Middle 
Ages, 233-236 ; humanism and, 242 ; Jesuit, 
267 ; modern, 353, 354, 634-636. 

Edward I, king of England, 197 ; VI, 262 ; 
VII, 480. 

Egypt, a seat of early civilization, 31 ; pre- 
historic era in, 32; history of, in antiquity, 
32, 33, 38, 102, 103, 105, 138; Napoleon in, 
389 ; under British sway, 549, 687. 

Elba, Napoleon at, 404, 413. 

" Elder Statesmen," Japanese, 562. 

Electricity, 595, 641, 643. 

E'lis, 77. 

Elizabeth, queen of England, 263, 765, 272, 
274, 282, 283, 325, 328, 485. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary , 743 



Emigration in the nineteenth century, 621. 

J&migrte (a-ine-graO, the, 379, 3S0, 386, 392, 
723. 

Ems (Ger. pron. arns) dispatch, the, 464. 

Encyclopedists, the, 361, 362, 369. 

Engineering, Oriental, 5J, 60. 

England, conquered by Teutonic peoples, 
168 ; expansion of, during the Middle Ages, 
197 ; the Reformation in, 262, 263 ; war be- 
tween Spain and, 272-274 ; under James I 
and Charles I, 283-289 ; the Commonwealth 
and the Protectorate, 289, 290 ; the Restora- 
tion and the "Glorious Revolution," 291- 
295; at war with Louis XIV, 298, 299, 300, 
302 ; in the War of the Austrian Succession 
and the Seven Years' War, 313, 314 ; rivalry 
of, with France, in India and North Amer- 
ica, 325-328, 331-333; loss of the Thirteen 
Colonies by, 334-340 ; at war with revolu- 
tionary and Napoleonic France, 385, 388, 
8S9, 390, 391, 395, 396, 39S, 399, 400, 401, 404, 
405 ; territorial acquisitions of, by the 
Vienna settlement, 416 ; between 1815 and 
1871, 420, 423, 424, 428, 430, 452, 526, 532, 
533, 534, 535, 536 ; movement for parlia- 
mentary reform in, 468-479 ; government 
of, 479-485 ; the Irish Question, 485-490 ; 
the British Empire, 490-496 ; the Industrial 
Revolution in, 582, 583, 591 ; between 1871 
and 1914, 653-655, 657, 658, 659, 663, 664; 
in the World War, 670. 672, 673, 674, 675- 
679, 683, 686, 687, 6S8, 689, 700, 701, 702, 703 ; 
territorial acquisitions of, by the Versailles 
settlement; 712, 714, 715. 

English language, the, 147, 238, 626, 627. 

"Enlightened despots," the, 362-364, 415. 

Enos-Midia line, the, 537. 

Entente cordiale (aN-taNf kor-dyal'), the, 
654, 655. 

Eolithic Age, the, 9, note 1. 

Eph'ors, Spartan, 81, 82. 

E-pi'rus, 77, 533. 

Epochs, geological, 3. 

Equal Franchise Act, the, 478, 633. 

E-ras'mus, Des-i-de'ri-us, 245. 

E-rech'theus, 93. 

Erfurt (er'f<56rt), 258. 

Eric the Red, 166, 16T. 

Ericsson, Leif (er'ik-s;/n, lif), 167. 

Eritrea (a-re-tre'a), 507, 547. 

Erse, 489. 

Es-pe-ran'to, 626. 

Estates-General, French, 370-373. 

Es-tho'ni-a, 700, 718. 
Esthonians, the, 18, 68. 
E-tru'ri-a, 113, 122. 

E-trus'cans, the, 113, 114, 115, 116, 121. 
Eucharist, the, sacrament of, 204, 265, 
352. 

Eugene (u-zhen'), Prince, 300. 
Eugenie (u-zha-ne'), Empress, 446 and note 
1, 498. 

Euphrates (d-fra'tGz) River, 30, 33. 
Europe, in the Ice Age, 4-5, 12 ; geography 
of, 65, 66 ; racial types of, 66, 67 ; languages 
spoken in, 67, 68. 
Evolutionary theory, the, 642, 643. 
Exchanges, produce and stock, 600, 601. 
Excommunication, 205, 206. 
Exploration, ancient, 47, 48, 109, note; 
medieval, 248, 249; modern, 251-254, 330 
342-344, 544-546, 577-580. 
Expositions, universal, 446, 627. 



Factory Acts, British, 611, 612. 

Factory system, the, 589, 591, 611. 

Fairs, medieval, 229. 

" Fall of Rome," the, 155, 156. 

Family, the, 12, 49, 76, 116, 117, 634. 

Faroe (far'6) Islands, 513. 

"February Revolution," the, 432-435, 618. 

Federations, Greek, 80, 109, 110. 

Ferdinand of Aragon, 200. 252, 269. 

Ferdinand I, Austrian emperor, 431, 436. 

Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor, 269. 

Ferdinand I, tsar of Bulgaria, 536, 537, 659, 
703. 

Ferdinand VII, king of Spain, 400, 421, 508, 
569. 

Feudalism, rise of, 169 ; extent of, in Europe, 
170 ; as a system of local government, 170- 
172 ; feudal warfare, 172, 174, 175 ; knight- 
hood and chivalry, 175, 176 ; royalty and, 
200, 201; the cities and, 222; Polish, 315, 
316 ; abolition of, in revolutionary France, 
375, 376 ; Japanese, 561, 562. 

Fez, 657. 

Fiction, modern, 645, 646. 

Field, Cyrus W., 598. 

Filipinos, the, 564, 640. 

Finance, international, 603. 

Finland, 167, 279, 396, 417, 522, 631, 632, 700, 
718. 

Finns, the, 18, 68, 167. 

Fire-making, origin of, 9. 

Fiume (fyoo'ma), 716. 

Flanders, 231, 297, 298, 703. 

Flemings, the, 426, 509. 

Florence, 241, 244. 

Florida, 254, 329, 333, 340, 573. 

Frankfort Assembly, the, 438. 

Foch (fosh), Ferdinand, 675, 702. 

Folk songs, 648. 

Formosa, 558, 562. 

Fo'ruin, Roman, 118, 120. 

" Fourteen Points," Wilson's, 697. 

Fox, George, 352. 

France, physical, 197 ; racial, 197-199 ; uni- 
fication of, during the Middle Ages, 199 ; 
the Reformation in, 274, 275 ; under Louis 
XIV, 295-302; in the War of the Austrian 
Succession and the Seven Years' War, 313, 
314 ; rivalry of, with England, in India and 
North America, 325-328, 331-333; alliance 
of, with the Thirteen Colonies, 338, 339 ; 
the French Revolution, 366-390; the Na- 
poleonic era, 390-408 ; restoration of Louis 
XVIII, 414; the "July Revolution," 424- 
426; the "February Revolution" and the 
Second French Republic, 432-435; under 
Napoleon III, 442-447 ; acquires Savoy and 
Nice, 452, 453 ; takes part in the Crimean 
War, 526, 534; the Franco-German War, 
463-466 ; between 1S71 and 1914, 498, 499, 
501-504, 650, 651, 652, 653, 654, 655, 657 ; in 
the World War, 670, 671, 672, 673, 674, 675- 
679, 700-703; territorial acquisitions of, by 
the Versailles settlement, 710, 712, 714. 
Franche-Comte (fraNsh-k6N-ta'), 299, 667. 
Franchise, the. See Suffrage. 
Francis I, emperor of Austria, 413, 419, 
726. 

Francis Ferdinand, assassination of, 669. 
Francis Joseph I, emperor of Austria, 436, 
439, 452, 453, 463, 519, 520, 521, 526, 574, 651, 
704. 
Fran-cis'cans, the, 210, 211. 



744 . Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Franco-German War, the, 456, 463-466, 650, 

651, 673. 
Frankfort, Treaty of, 465, 498, 651. 
Franklin, Benjamin, 341, 356, 367. 
Franks, the, 160, 161. 
Frederick II, the Great, king of Prussia, 

312-314, 317, 318, 363, 364, 460, 636, 638, 666, 

712; 111,517. 
Frederick William III, king of Prussia, 413, 

726 ; IV, 431, 438, 439, 459, 516. 
Freemasonry, 639. 
Free trade, adoption of, by Great Britain, 

604. 
French, Sir John, 675. 
French language, the, 237, 297, 626. 
French Revolution, the, 366-390, 407, 408. 
Friars, orders of, 210, 211. 
Friday, the Mohammedan Sabbath, 183, 184. 
Friedland (fret'lant), battle of, 396, 397. 
Frob'ish-er, Sir Martin, 273, 328. 
Fry, Mrs. Elizabeth, 629. 
Fugger, Jacob, 229. 
Fulton, Robert, 593, 597. 
Future life, the, Oriental and Greek ideas of, 

55, 76. 

Ga'des. See Cadiz. 

Gaelic (gal'ik), 196. 

Galicia (gri-lish'i-a), 317, 416, 429, 519, 6S0, 
682, 686, 713, 717. 

Galileo (gal-i-le'o), 247. 

Gal-lip'o-li, 683. 

Gallo-Romans, the, 199, 237. 

Gama (ga'ma), Vasco da, 251, 253. 

Gambetta (Fr. pron. gaN-be-ta/), Leon, 49S, 
499. 

Garibaldi (ga-re-biil'de), Giuseppe, 453-455, 
505. 

Gas engine, the, 596. 

Gaul (gol), conquest and Romanization of, 
137. 

Gauls, the, 121, 125, 198, 199. 

Geneva, 261, 632, 729. 

Geneva Convention, the, 727. 

Genoa, 240, 255, 279, 389, 397, 415, 450, note 1. 
See also Ligurian Republic. 

Geology, 642. 

George, David Lloyd, 489, 639, 709, 728. 

George I, king of England, 294, 46S ; II, 329, 
46S ; III, 325, 387, 344, 468, 471 ; IV 468, 
726 ; V, 479, 480. 

Georgia, American state, 329, 337. 

Georgia, Caucasian republic, 719. 

German East Africa, 549, 6S6, 712. 

German National Monument, the, 518. 

German Revolution, the, 704, 720-722. 

German Southwest Africa, 547, 549, 686, 712. 

Germanic Confederation, the, 418, 428, 45S, 
461, 463, 513. 

Germans, the, early culture of, 158, 159; 
their invasions of the Roman world, 159, 
160 ; fusion of, with the Romans, 160. 

Germany, physical features of, 158 ; political 
condition of, during the Middle Ages, 165, 
166 ; the Reformation in, 258-261, 269, 275- 
277; disunion of, 279; during the revolu- 
tionary and Napoleonic era, 386, 389, 396, 
398, 403 ; after the Vienna settlement, 418 ; 
revolutionary movements of 1830 and 1848 
in, 430, 431, 437-439 ; unification of, 456- 
467 ; government of, 513-516, 721 ; between 
1871 and 1914, 516-518, 650-668 ; in the World 
War, 669-705; peace treaty with, 708, 709, 



710, 712, 713; the German Republic, 720- 
722. 

Germ theory of disease, the, 644. 

Gi-bral'tar, 301, 302, 492. 

Gid'e-on, 35. 

Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 328. 

Girondists (ji-ron'dists), the, 384, 386. 

Gladiatorial combats, 146, 147, 153. 

Gladstone, W. E., 476, 477, 478, 487, 488, 
604, 639. 

"Glorious Revolution," the, 293, 294, 336, 
366, 407, 485. 

Gnossus (nos'ws), 71, note 1. 

Goethe (gu'te), 646. 

Golden Horde, the, 193. 

Gold standard, the, adoption of, 602. 

Gorizia, 686. 

Gothic architecture, 232, 233, 243. 

Goths. See Ostrogoths, Visigoths. 

Gracchus (grak'us), Tiberius, 133 ; Gaius, 
133, 134. 

Gra-na'da, 200. 

Grand Alliance, the, 300, 302. 

" Grand Design " of Henry IV, 726. 

Grand Duchy of Warsaw, the, 398, 417. 

Gravitation, law of, 356. 

Great Britain. See England, Ireland, Scot- 
land, Wales. 

Great Charter. See Magna Carta. 

Great King, the, of Persia, 39, 41. 

Great Pyramid, the, 59. 

Great Rebellion. See Puritan Revolution. 

" Great South Land," the, 343. 

Great Wall of China, the, 191, 557. 

Great Western, the, 594. 

Greece, physical features of, 70, 71. 

Greek Church, the, 179, 351. 

Greek Empire. See Byzantine Empire. 

" Greek fire," 178. 

Greek language, the, 78, 106, 242. 

Greeks, the, prehistoric migrations of, 73, 
74 _; during the Homeric Age, 75, 76; re- 
ligion and religious institutions of, 76-78; 
their city-states, 79-82 ; colonial expansion 
of, 82-84; the Persian wars, 84-89 ; ascend- 
ency of Athens, 89-93 ; conflicts between, 
97 ; become subject to Macedonia, 98-101 ; 
form ^Etolian and Achaean leagues, 109, 110 ; 
become subject to Rome, 128 ; conquered 
by the Ottoman Turks, 532 ; during the 
nineteenth and twentieth centuries, 533, 
536, 537, 539, 682, 684, 714. 

Greenland, 166, 167, 578. 

Grey, Earl, 471, 472. 

Grey, Sir Edward, 670, 672. 

Grotius (gro'shi-*s), Hugo, 277, 278. 

Guam (gwam), 565, 574. 

Gua-te-ma'la, 572. 

Guiana, 324, 416, 493, 727. 

Guilds, medieval, 225-228, 235, 350, 591, 609. 

Guizot (ge-zo'), F. P. G., 434. 

Gulf Stream drift, the, 66. 

Gus-ta'vus A-dol'phus, 276, 278, 329. 

Habeas Corpus Act, the, 291, 292, 468. 

Hades (ha'dez), Greek underworld, 76. 

Ha'dri-an, Wall of, 141. 

Hague (hag), the, 426, 665. 

Hague Peace Conferences, the, 665, 672, 727, 

Hague Tribunal, the, 670, 727, 728. 
Haig (hag), Sir Douglas, 678, 679. 
Haiti (ha'ti), 572. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 745 



Hamburg- (harn'boTkK), 222, 255. 

Hamitic languages and peoples, 22, 542. 

Hammurabi (ham-6t>-ra'be), Babylonian 
king, 84, 41, CO ; code of, 50, 51. 

Hampden, John, 2S5, 286, 287. 

Han'ni-bal, 12(3, 127. 

Hanno, exploring voyage of, 47, 48, 109, note. 

Han'o-ver, 294, 418, 480, 457 and note 1, 462, 
468. 

Hanoverian dynasty, the, 294, 295 and note 1. 

Hapsburg (hiips'bde-rK) dynasty, the, 279, 
309 and note 1, 521, note 1, 704. 

Harding, Warren G., 710. 

Hargreaves, James, 585, 587. 

Hastings, battle of, 168. 

Hawaiian (hii-wi'yan) Islands, 344, 565, 574. 

Haydn (Ger. pron. hi'd'n), Joseph, 647. 

Hebrews, the, 35, 36. 

Hegira (he-ji'ra), the, 1S2 and note 2. 

Heidelberg (hi'del-beric), man, 5, 6. 

Hejaz (hef-fiz'), the, kingdom of, 687, 715. 

Helgoland (hel'go-lant), 416, 663, note 2, 713. 

Hel-le-nis'tic Age, the, 105-110. 

Henry IV, king of France, 274, 275, 726. 

Henry VIII, king of England, 262, 265, 276, 
282, 283, 485. 

He'ra, 76. 

Hercules, constellation, 356. 

Hermits, early Christian, 208. 

He-rod'o-tus, 90, 95. 

Herzegovina (her-tse-go-ve'na), 536, 651, 660, 
669, 715. 

Hesse (hes), 463, note 1. 

Hesse-Cassel, 463. 

Hi-er-o-glyph'ic writing, 25 and note 2, 26. 

Hindenburg (hin'den-bottrK), Paul von, 680, 
682, 701. 

Hindenburg Line, the, 679, 703. 

Hindus, the, 553, 554. 

Hiram, king of Tyre, 35. 

History, definition and scope of, 1 ; begin- 
nings of, 27 ; subdivisions of, 28 ; modern 
study of, 645. 

Hit'tites. the, 62, 63. 

Ho-hen-lin'den, battle of, 390. 

Hohenzollern (hoVn-tsol-ern) dynasty, the, 
302, 310, 311, 517, 704. 

Holland, J. P., 597. 

Holland, separates from Spain, 270-272; inde- 
pendence of, recognized, 277, 279 ; wars of, 
with Louis XIV, 298, 299, 300, 324; ac- 
quires a colonial empire, 322-324 ; at war 
with Great Britain, 338, 340; during the 
revolutionary and Napoleonic era, 385, 386, 
397 ; the Austrian Netherlands united with, 
416 ; loses the Austrian Netherlands, 426- 
428 ; government of, 511, 512. 

Holstein (hol'shtln), 457, 45S, 462, 463. See 
also Schleswig. 

Holy Alliance, the, 726. 

Holy Land. See Palestine. 

Holy Roman Empire, the, 164, 165, 277, 398, 
457, 45S. 

Homage, ceremony of, 172. 

Homer, 75, 76, 78. 

Homeric Age, the, 75, 76. 

Home Rule, Irish, 488-490. 

Hon-du'ras, 572 and note 1. 

Hong-kong', 492, 558. 
Hoover, H. C, 6S0, 695. 
Hos'pi-tal-ers, the, order of, 189. 
Hotel des Invalides (6-tel' da-zaN-va-lod'), 
the, 296. 



Hottentots, the, 542. 

Hudson Bay Company, the, 568. 

Hudson, Henry, 323. 

Huguenots (hu'ge-nots), the, 274, 275, 
329, 353, 636. 

Hugo, Victor, 646. 

Humanism, 242 and note 2. 

Humbert I, 505. 

Humboldt, Alexander von, 577. 

Hungarians. See Magyars. 

Hungary, 191, 192, 308, 431, 436, 437, 519, 
520, 521, 713, 714,722. See also Austria- 
Hungary. 

Huns, the, 191, 192. 

Husein (hot>-san'), king of the Hejaz, 715. 

Huss (hits), John, 258. 

Hyksos (hik'sos), the, 82. 

Ice Age, the, 3-5. 

Iceland, 166, 513. 

Icelandic language, the, 238 and note 1. 

Iliad, the, 75, 78, 101. 

Illiteracy, decrease of, 635, 636. 

Il-lyr'i-an Provinces, the, 397, 416. 

Imperial federation movement, the, 496. 

Imperialism, modern, 492, 540-542, 656. 

Incas, the, 254. 

Inclosures in Great Britain, 606, 607. 

Indemnity, French, 465, 651 ; German, 712. 

Independents, the, 288 and note 2, 290, 291. 

" Index of Prohibited Books," the, 268. 

India, in antiquity, 29, 38, 104; rivalry of 
France and Fngiand in, 325-328 ; a part of 
the British Empire, 493, 553; peoples of, 
553, 554 ; civilization of, 554, 555. 

Indians, American, 255. 

Indies, East, 249, 253, 254, 323; West, 252, 
254, 324, 493, 513, 572, 573, 574, 628. 

Indo-China, 503, 552, 553, 556, 558. 

Indo-European languages, 22, 23, 73, 113, 114. 

Indulgences, 258, 259. 

Industrial Revolution, the, 581-623. 

Industry, Oriental, 44, 45; at Athens, 92; 
Roman, 143, 144 ; in medieval cities, 225- 
228; the Industrial Revolution, 5S1-592; 
government regulation of, 610-614. 

Initiative, the, in Switzerland, 511. 

Inquisition, the, 268, 269, 270. 

Institutes of the Christian Religion, Cal- 
vin's, 261, 282. 

Instrument of Government, the, 290, 412. 

Insurance, development of, 601, 613, 621, 
622. 

Internationalism, ancient, 110, 148 ; medieval, 
204; modern, 625-627, 650. 

International law, 277, 278. 

International Postal Union, the, 599, 627. 

International Red Cross, the, 627, 632, 727. 

Invention, significance of, 5S3 ; development 
of, 5S3, 584. 

I-o'ni-a, 74, 75, 85, 87, 533. 

Ionian Islands, the, 416, 531, 583. 

Ionian Revolt, the, 85, 86. 

Iran (e-ran'), plateau of, 29, 30, 104. 

Ireland, conquered by England, 197, 279, 
485; the Irish Question, 485-490. 

Irish Nationalists, the, 485, 488. 

Iron, introduction of, 15-17 ; use of, in mod- 
ern industry, 587, 5S8. 

" Iron Chancellor." See Bismarck. 

" Ironsides, " Cromwell's, 287. 

Isabella of Castile, 200, 252, 258, 269. 

I'sis, 149. 



746 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Islam (ls'luni), beliefs and practices of, 182- 
184. 

Isonzo River, 686. 

Israel (iz'ra-el), kingdom of, 35, 36. 

Israelites. See Hebrews. 

Issus, battle of, 102, 103. 

Italia Irredenta, 456, 684. 

Italians, ancient, 114,' 115. 

Italy, geography of, 112, 113 ; early peoples 
of, 113-115; under Roman rule, 121-123; 
political condition of, throughout the Mid- 
dle Ages, 165, 166; the Renaissance in, 240- 
245 ; disunion of, 279 ; during the Napo- 
leonic era, 388, 389, 390, 393, 397, 40S ; after 
the Vienna settlement, 417, 418 ; revolu- 
tionary movements of 1830 and 1848 in, 
430, 437; unification of, 447^156; between 
1871 and 1914, 505, 507, 508, 651, 661 ; in 
the World War, 670, 684-686, 704 ; acquires 
Austrian and Turkish territory, 713, 714. 

Ivan (e-v&n') III, the Great, tsar, 304. 

Jacobins (jak'6-bins), the, 381, 383, 384, 387, 

388. 
James I, king of England, 283 and note 1, 

284, 294, 328, 485; II, 292, 293, 329, 331, 

479, 485. 

Jamestown, settlement of, 328. 
Jan-i-za'ries, the, 530. 
Japan, geography and people of, 560, 561 ; 

civilization of, 561 ; during the nineteenth 

and twentieth centuries, 562, 563, 655, 657, 

686, 687, 693, 707, 712, 723. 
Je-ho'vah, 51, 54. 
Jena (ya'na), battle of, 396, 397. 
Jenghiz Khan (jen'giz Kan'), 192, 193. 
Jerusalem, 35, 37, 150, 1S9, 687, 703. 
Jesuits. See Society of Jesus. 
Jesus, 149 and note 1, 183. 
Jews, the, 22, 149, 150, 203, 294, 353, 52S, 

640, 714. See also Hebrews. 
Joffre (zhoif), Joseph, 675, 702. 
John, king of England, 201. 
John VI. king of Portugal, 421. 
Joliet (Fr. pron. zho-lyii'), Louis, 330. 
Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, 363, 364. 
Joseph Bonaparte, 397, 400, 508, 569. 
Josephine, Empress, 397, note 1, 401. 
Judah, Hebrew tribe, 35. 
Ju-de'a, kingdom of, 35, 36, 37. 
Jugoslavia (yoo'go'slav-i-a), 713, 716. 
Jugoslavs, the, 179, 530, 669, 715. 
" July Revolution," the, 424-426. 
Junkers (yoon'kers), Prussian, 311, 460, 

516, 667. 
Ju'pi-ter, 117. 
Jus-tin'i-an, 145. 

"Just price," the, medieval idea of, 228. 
Jutes, the, 168. 
Jutland, battle of, 688. 

Kaaba (ka'ds-ba), the, 180, 181, 182. 

Kant (kant), Immanuel, 645, 726. 

Ker'en-sky, Alexander, 699. 

Khartum (Kar-toom'), 31, 550. 

Kiauchau (kyou-chou'), 558, note 1, 687,712. 

Kiel Canal, 663, 668. 

Kiev (ke'yef), 193, 522. 

Kitchener, Herbert, 549. 

"Kitchen middens," 13, 14. 

Knighthood, 175. 

Koch (koK), Robert, 644. 

Koniggratz (kii-nlK-grets'), battle of, 463. 



Konigsberg (ku'niKS-berk), 645. 
Koran (ko-ran'), the, 183, 1S4. 
Korea, 556, 558, 562 and note 2, 563, 577. 
Kosciuszko (Polish pron. kosh-chyoosh'ko), 
Tadeusz, 31S. 

Kossovo (kos'6-vo), battle of, 532. 
Kossuth (kosh'Oot), Louis, 436, 437, 519. 
Kremlin, the, 523. 
Kruger, Paul, 548. 
Kublai Khan (koo'bli Kan'), 243. 
Kul-tur', German, 665, 666. 

Labor legislation, 611-614. 

Labor movement, the, 609, 610. 

Lab'ra-dor, 577. 

Ladrone (la-dro'nii) Islands. See Marianas 

Islands. 
Lafayette (la-fa-yef) , Marquis de, 367, 373, 

375 425 

La Fere (la far'), 701. 
La.issez-faire (le'sa-far'), doctrine of, 355, 

611, 615, 616. 

Lake dwellings, Swiss, 13. 
Land Purchase Acts, Irish, 487, 607. 
Land tenure, ancient, 41, 42, 131, 144; medi- 
eval, 170, 171 ; modern, 485-487, 606-608. 
Langley, S. P., 596. 
Language of man, the, 21-23, 626, 627. 
Laos (la'os), 552. 

Laplace (la-pliis'), Marquis de, 356. 
Lapps, the, IS. 

La Salle (la sal'), Robert de, 330, 573. 
Lateran Palace, the, 213, 507. 
Latin colonies, the, 123, 126, 134. 
Latin language, the, 146, 147, 236, 237, 245, 

626. 
Latin League, the, 115, 121. 
Latins, the, 115, 121. 
Latin War, the, 121. 
Latium (la'shi-wm), 115, 122. 
Latvia, 718. 

Laud, Archbishop, 285. 
Lavoisier (la-vwa-z^a'), 357. 
Law, Oriental, 49-52; Roman, 120, 145, 146; 

modern, 201, 277, 278, 292, 391. 
League of Nations, the, 709, 710, 712, 717, 

722, 728-730. 

Learned societies, foundation of, 357. 
Leb'a-non Mountains, the, 84. 
Legates, papal, 212. 
Legion of Honor, French, 393. 
Legitimists, the, in France, 432. 
Leibniz (Hp'nits), Freiherr von, 356. 
Leipzig (lip'siK), battle of, 403. 
Lenin (lii-nen'), Nicholas, 699, 700, 723. 
Leo XIII, pope, 507. 
Le6n (la-on'), kingdom of, 199, 200. 
Leon, Ponce de, 254. 
Leonardo da Vinci (la-6-nar'do da ven'che), 

244. 

Le-on'i-das, Spartan king, 88. 
Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, 428. 
Leopold II, kinsr of Belgium, 510. 
Lepanto (la-pan'to), battle of, 308. 
Lesseps (le-seps'), Ferdinand de. 550, 576. 
Lettres de cachet (let'r de ka-she'), 369, 374. 
Letts, the, 700, 718. 
Lewis and Clark, explorations of, 577. 
Lhasa (las'a) , 552. 
Liberal Party, British, 473, 476, 477, 478, 4S5, 

674. 

Liberation, war of, 403, 457, 663. 
Liberia, 546, 695. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 747 



"Liberty, Equality, Fraternity," 361, 397, 

407, 408. 

Lib'y-a, 508, 547/ 
Liein'i-us, 151. 
Liege (le-iizh'), 675. 
Ligny (len-ye'), battle of, 404. 
Ligurian Republic, the, 3S9, 397. 
Lim'burg, 42S and note 1. 
Lin-naVus, 357. 

Liquor traffic, the, abolition of, 631. 
Lisbon, 251, 254, 255, 322, 400. 
Literature, Oriental, 55. 56; Greek, 75, 94- 

96; Renaissance, 241, 242, 245, 246; modern, 

644-646. 
Lithuania, 279, 315, 6S6, 700, 718. 
Lith-u-a'ni-ans, the, 311, 315. 
Liverpool, 255. 
Livingstone, David, 545, 546. 
Livonia, 700, 718. 
Locke, John, 358, 359, 367. 
Locomotive, the, 594, 595. 
Lom'bards, the, 159, 160, 162. 
Lom'bar-dy, 416, 417, 437, 452, 453. 
London, 224, 226, 255. 
Long Parliament, the, 286, 287. 
Lords, House of, 2S2, 469, 4S0, 482. 
Lorraine (16-ran'), 277, 297, 299, 367, 407, 

465, 466, 513, 516, 651, 667 and note 1, 705, 

711. See also Alsace. 
Lothair (lo-thar'), 164. 
Louis XIV, king of France, 295-302, 324, 

325, 330, 331, 349, 350, 353, 359, 394, 395, 

403, 547, 673, 674 ; XV, 302, note 1, 318, 331, 

350, 367, 36S; XVI, 369, 370,372,373,375, 

376, 378, 3S0, 381, 382, 384, 386; XVIII, 

404 and note 1, 414, 420, 424. 
Louis Bonaparte, 442. 
Louis Napoleon. See Napoleon III. 
Louis Philippe (loS-e' fe-lep'), king of France, 

425, 426, 430, 432, 434, 540. 
Louis the German, 164. 
Louisiana, 330, 333, 573. 
Lou vain (loo-vaN'), 679. 
Louvre (loO'vr'), the, palace of, 246, 247. 
Loyola (lo-yo'la), St. Ignatius, 266, 267. 
Lubeck (lu'bek), 222, 255. 
Lublin, Union of, 315. 
Lucca, 279, 417, 453, note 1. 
Lu-cerne', the Lion of, 383. 
Lu'den-dorff, Eric von, 701. 

Lu-si-ta'ni-a, the, 690, 691. 

Luther, Martin, 258-260. 

Lutheranism, 261, 264, 265, 269, 270, 275, 

276, 352, 636. 

Lux'em-burg, 428 and note 1, 458, 672, 675, 
686, 705. 

Luxury, Grfeco-Macedonian, 108 ; Roman, 
130. 

Lyd'i-a, 38, 45, 63, 84. 

Lyell (li'el), Sir Charles, 642. 

Ma-ca'o, 558. 

Macedonia (mas-e-do'n-i-ir), conquered by 
Persia, 85, S6 ; inhabitants of, 97, 98 ; under 
Philip II, 98-100; under Alexander the 
Great, 101 ; after Alexander, 105; conquered 
by Rome, 128; during the nineteenth and 
twentieth centuries, 533, 536, 537, 531), 661. 

Machinerv, introduction of, 584-588, 5S9, 
591, 623. 

MacMahon (mak-ma-oN'), Marshal, 464, 499. 

Madagascar, 503, 540, 547. 

Madeleine (mad-lin'), La, 433. 



Ma-dras', 325, 327. 

Ma-gel'lan, Ferdinand, 253, 254, note 1, 343, 

564. 

Madeira Islands, 509. 
Magenta (raa-jen't(i), battle of, 452. 
Magic, Babylonian, 52, 53. 
Mag'na Car'ta, 201, 284, 291, 292, 293. 
Mag'na Gra»'ci-a, 83, 122, 132. 
Magyars (mod'yors), the, IS, 68, 192, 519, 
520, 722. 

Main (Ger. pron. min) River, 463. 
Mainz (mints), 243, 705. 
Ma-lac'ca, 253. 
Malay Archipelago, 254. 
Malay Peninsula, 254. 
Man-i-to'ba, 568. 
Malta, 416, 492. 
Mancha dynasty, the, 559. 
Man-chu'ri-a, 556, 558, 562, 563. 
Manhattan Island, 324. 
Manor, the medieval, 214, 219. 
Manufacturing, inventions in, 584-587. 
Mar'a-thon, battle of, 87. 
Mar-co'ni, Guglielmo, 59S, 600. 
Mar-do'ni-us, S6, 89. 
Ma-ren'go, battle of, 390. 
Marianas Islands, 253. 
Maria Louisa, 401. 
Maria Theresa (te-re's«), 310, 312, 313, 314, 

317, 318, 863. 
Marie Antoinette (aN-twa-nef), 370, 380, 

382 386 

Ma'ri-us,*Gai'us, 134, 135, 137. 
Markets, medieval, 228. 
Marlborough, Duke of, 300. 
Mar'mo-ra, Sea of, 714. 
Marne (marn), the, battle of, 675, 676, 702. 
Marquette (mar-kef), Pierre, 330. 
Marriage, 146, 147, 205, 353, 633, 634. 
Mars, 117, 118. 
Marseillaise (mar-se-yaz'), the, 385 and 

note 1, 441. 

Marseilles (mar-salz'), 84. 
Martyrs, Christian, 151. 
Marx, Karl, 618, 619, 720. 
Mary (wife of William III), 293 and note 2. 
Mary Stuart, queen of Scots, 283, note 1. 
Marv Tudor, queen of England, 262, 263. 
Ma'sa-ryk, T. G., 716. 
Massachusetts, 328, 337. 
Mathematics, Oriental, 58, 59 ; medieval, 

233 ; modern, 355, 356. 
Mauritius (mo-rish'I-ws), 492. 
Maximilian, emperor of Mexico, 520, 574. 
Mazurian Lakes, the, battle of, 680. 
Mazzini (mat-se'ne), Giuseppe, 437, 449, 450, 

505. 
Mecca, ISO, 181, 1S2, 183, 659, 687, 715. 
Me'di-a, 37. 
Medicine and surgery, 60, 109, 17S, 186, 236, 

247, 643, 644. 

Medina (ma-de'na), 182, 659, 6S7, 715. 
Mediterranean basin, the, 68-71. 
Mediterranean, racial type, the, 67, 71, 114. 
Melanesia, 563. 
Memphis (mrm'fis), 32, 102. 
Menes (me'nez), 32. 
Menhirs, 13. 

Mercantile system, the, 320, 321, 354. 
Mercurv, Roman deity, 118. 
Mes-o-po-ta'mi-a, 659, 687, 703, 715. 

Mes-si'ah, the, 150. 

"Mestizos," the, 569. 



748 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Metals, introduction and use of, 15-17. 

Methodists, the, 352, 639. 

Metternich (met'er-niK), Prince, 413, 418, 

419, 421, 423, 424, 426, 429, 430, 431, 435, 

439, 521, 525, 527, 532, 574, 726. 
Metternichismus, 419, 423, 431. 
Metz, 277, 297, 464, 465. 
Meuse (muz) River, 322. 
Mexico, 254, 255, 572, 574, 638, 693, 730. 
Michael Romanov, 304. 
Michelangelo (Ital. pron. me-kel-an'ja-16), 

244. 

Micronesia, 563. 
Middle Ages, the, 157, 158. 
Middle class, the. See Bourgeoisie, Third 

Estate 
"Middle Europe," 655, 659, 661. 
Mikado (mi-ka'do), Japanese, 561, 562. 
Milan (mil-an), 240, 279, 302, 437, 452. 
Milan Decree, the, 399. 
Militarism, modern, 661-665. 
Mil-ti'a-des, 87. 

Mine fields, North Sea, 693, 694. 
Mi-nor'ca, 302, 340. 
Mir, the Russian, 608. 
Mirabeau (me-ra-bo'), Count, 371, 373, 377. 

378, 380, 3S1. 
Missions and missionaries, Christian, 267, 

330, 546, 640, 641. 
Mississippi River, 330. 
Mitb/ra, 149. 

Modena (mo'da-nii), 279, 417, 430, 437, 453. 
Mo-guls', the, 325. 
Mo-ham'med, prophet, 180, 1S2, 183. 
Mohammed II, sultan, 193, 194. 
Mohammedanism. See Islam. 
Moldavia, 535. 

Moltke, Helmuth von, 460, 461, 463, 464. 
Mo-luc'oas. See Spice Islands. 
Monarchists, the, in France, 502. 
Monasticism, medieval, 208-210. 
Money, Oriental, 45 ; Roman, 118 ; increased 

supply of, after the discovery of America, 

256. 
Mongolia, 192, 557. 

Mongolian race, the. See Yellow race. 
Mongols, the, conquests of, 192, 193. 
Monotheism, Oriental, 53, 54. 
Monroe Doctrine, the, 423, 424, 574, 575, 657. 
Mons (moNs), 675. 
Montaigne (mon-tan'), 246. 
Montcalm (moN-kalm'), Marquis de, 333, 
Mon'te Cas-si'no, 208. 
Mon-te-ne'gro, 308, 531, 532, 536, 537, 539. 

660, 661, 6S2, 6S3, 686, 707, 715, 716. 
Montesquieu (moN-tes-ke-u'), 359, 360, 361. 

362, 367. 
Montgolfier (moN-gol-fyi') Brothers, the, 

356, 357. 

Montreal, 330, 333. 
Moors, the, 199 and note 1. 
Moralitv, Oriental, 49-52. 
Mo-ra'vi-a, 519, 716. 
Mo-re'a, the, 529, 532. 
Moreau (mo-nV), General, 390. 
Morocco, 503, 547, 657. 
Morse, Samuel F. B., 597. 
Mosaic code, the, 51, 52. 
Moscow (mos'ko), 193,402,522. 
Moses, Hebrew lawgiver, 51, 183. 
Moslem, the name, 182 and note 1. 
Mosul (mo-sool'), 189. 
Mo-zam-bique', 547. 



Mozart (mo'tsart), W. A., 647. 

Mummification, Egyptian practice of, 55. 

Mus'co-vy, principality of,-522. 

Museum, Alexandrian, 108, 109. 

Music, Renaissance, 244, 245: modern, 646- 

648. 
Mut-su-hi'to, emperor of Japan, 562 and 

note 1. 

Myc'a-le, battle of, 89. 
Mycenae (ml-se'ne), 71, note 1, 75. 

Namur (na-mur'), 405, 675. 

Nancy (naN-se'), 676. 

Nan sen, Fridtjof, 577, 578. 

Nantes (naNt), Edict of, 275, 353, 636. 

Naples, 83, 302, 397, 421, 423. 

Napoleon I, Bonaparte, 387-40S, 441, 442, 
448, 451, 569, 573, 628, 663, 673, 674, 714, 
726; III, 435, 437, 442, 444-447, 452, 453, 
455, 456, 462, 464, 466, 499, 520, 534, 574. 

Napoleonic dynasty, the, 401, note 1. 

Napoleonic legend, the, 405, 435. 

Naseby (naz'bi), battle of, 287. ' 

Nassau, 463. 

Na-tal', 548. 

National Assembly, French, 372, 373, 374, 
375, 376, 377, 378, 383, 609. 

National Convention, French, 383, 384, 385, 
387, 388, 391, 392. 

National Guard, French, 375. 

National Woman Suffrage Association, the, 
633. 

Nationalism, spirit of, 201 ; disregard of, by 
the Congress of Vienna, 415, 418 ; between 
1815 and 1S4S, 426, 430, 431, 436, 437; 
modern, 440-442 ; between 1848 and 1871, 
447^150, 452, 456-459, 466, 467, 650 ; in the 
Balkans, 531, 537 ; imperialism and, 541, 
656 ; the Industrial Revolution and, 582. 

Nature worship, 52. 

Nau'cra-tis, 84. 

Na-va-ri'no, battle of, 532. 

Navarre (n«-var'), kingdom of, 199. 

Navies, modern, 654, 663, 664. 

Navigation Acts, the, 334, 335, 605. 

Neanderthal (na-an'der-tal) man, 6, 7. 

Ne-ar'chus, voyage of, 104. 

Neb-u-chad-nez'zar, 37, 41. 

Nebular hypothesis, the, 356. 

Negative confession, the, 50. 

Negro race, the. See Black race. 

Nelson, Horatio, 389, 396. 

Neolithic Act. See New Stone Age. 

Neptune, planet, 641. 

Netherlands, Spanish, 270, 279, 298, 302; 
Austrian, 302, 3S4, 389, 416. 

Neuilly (nu-ye'), Treaty of, 714. 

Neutrality, Swiss, 417, 727 ; Belgian, 428, 
672, 673, 727. 

Neva River, 306. 

New Brunswick, 567, 568. 

New Amsterdam, 324. 

New Caledonia, 503, 504. 

New England, 329, 354, 634, 685 

Newfoundland, 331, 333, 567, 568. 

New France, 330, 333. 

New Guinea, 564, S78. 

New Jersey, 329. 

New Mexico, 254. 

" New Model," the, 287, 288. 

New Netherland, 324, 328. 

New Orleans, 330 and note 1. 

New South Wales, 566. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 749 



New Stone Age, the, 12-14. 

New Testament, the. See Bible. 

New York, 328. 

New Zealand, 343, 565, 566, 712. 

Newspapers, 599, 600. 

Newton, Sir Isaac, 356. 

Nica?a (nl-se'd), Council of, 151. 

Nicaragua, 572. 

Nice (nes), 3SS, 415, 452, 453. 

Nicene Creed, the, 151. 

Nicholas, Grand Duke, 680. 

Nicholas I, tsar of Russia, 430, 437, 526, 532, 

533 ; II, 52S, 529, 664, 698, 717. 
Nieuport, 676. 
Niger (ni'jer) River, 544, 
Nigeria, 493. 

Nightingale, Florence, 534. 
Nihilism, Russian, 528. 
Nile (nil) River, 31, 544. 
Ninety-five Theses, Luther's, 259. 
Nineveh (nin'e-ve), 36, 37, 103. 
Nip-pon', 560. 
Nobilitv, Oriental, 41, 42 ; feudal, 169-176, 

200. 201, 34S; British, 34S ; French, 348, 

349. 

Nonconformists. See Dissenters. 
Nor'man-dy, 16S, 199. 
Normans, the, 168 and note 1, 188, 238. 
North, Lord, 468 

North German Confederation, the, 463, 466. 
Northmen, the, inroads of, 166 ; in Iceland, 

Greenland, and North America, 166, 167 ; 

in Sweden and Russia, 167 ; in France, 

England, Italy, and Sicily, 167-169. 
North Pole, the, discovery of, 577, 578. 
North Sea barrage, the, 693, 694. 
Northwest Passage, the, 577 and note 1. 
Norway, 166, 261, 265, 279, 398, 417, 512, 513, 

631. 
Notre Dame (no'tr datn'), Cathedral of, at 

Paris, 393, 500. 
Novara (no-va'ra), battle of, 437. 
Nova Scotia, 331, 567, 568. 
Novgorod (nov'go-rot), 304. 
Nuncios (nun'shi-oz), papal, 212. 

Obregon, Alvaro, 572. 

Oceania, opening up and partition of, 563- 
565. 

O'Connell, Daniel, 488. 
Oc-ta'vi-an, 138. See also Augustus. 
Octroi (ok-trwa'), 228. 
Oddfellowship, 639. 
Odysseus (o-dis'us), 75. 
Odyssey (od'i-si), the, 75, 78. 
Oise (waz) River, 701. 
Old Regime, the, 346-364. 
Old Stone Age, the, 8-12. 
Old Testament, the. See Bible. 
O-lym'pi-a, 77, 78. 
Olympian games, the, 77, 78, 151. 
O-lym'pus, Mount, 76. 
Ontario, 567, 568. 

" Open field " system, the, 215, 216, 605. 
Ophir (6'fer), 47. 
Oracles, Greek, 77, 151. 
Orange, House of, 416, 511. 
Orange Free State, the, 548. 
Orders in Council, British, 399, 567. 
Oregon, 573. 
Orlando, Vittorio, 709. 
Orleans (or-la-iiN'), 199, 236 ; Duke of, 386. 
Or'muz, 253. 



Orthodox (Russian) Church, the, 307, 362, 
522, 528, 639, 718. 

Os'tro-goths, the, 159, 160, 161, 162. 

Oth'man, 193. 

Otto I, the Great, 164, 165, 192, 398. 

Ottoman Empire, the, extent of, in 1648, 279 
280 ; between 1648 and 1815, 308, 309, 531 
between 1815 and 19H, 531-539, 658-661 
in the World War, 683, 684, 687, 693, 703, 
704 ; territorial losses of, by Treaty of 
Sevres, 714, 715. 

Ot'to-man Turks, the, 18, 193, 194, 200, 530. 

Ottomanization, policy of, 537, 715. 

Owen, Robert, 617. 

Oxford, university of, 235. 

Pacific Ocean, discovery and exploration of, 
253, 254, 342-344 ; partition of, 565, 712. 

Paganism, decline of, 149 ; prohibition of, 
151. 

Painting, Palaeolithic, 11 ; Oriental, 57, 58 ; 
Renaissance, 244, 246 ; modern, 649. 

Pa-he-o-lith'ic Age. See Old Stone Age. 

Pal'a-tine Mount, 115. 

Pale, the, in Ireland, 197. 

Palestine, 35, 102, 136, 150, 687, 714. 

Palestrina (pa-las-tre'na), 244, 245. 

Panama, 576, 695. 

Panama Canal, the 492, 576. 

Pan-Americanism, 575, 576. 

Pan-American Union, the, 576. 

Pan-Germanism, 665-668. 

Pan-German League, the, 667. 

Pan-Hellenism, 533. 

Pantheon (p6n-ta-ON')» the, at Paris, 502. 

Papacy. See Roman Church. 

Papal Guarantees, Law of, 507. 

Papal infallibility, dogma of, 268, note 1. 

Papal States. See States of the Church. 

Paper, 26, 243. 

Papyrus, 26, 108, 131. 

Parchment, 108, 131. 

Paris, 199, 234, 236, 373, 375, 392, 465, 676. 

Paris, Peace of (1763), 314, 328, 333, 367 ; 
(1783), 338, 339 ; (1856), 447, 452, 534, 535, 
727; (189S), 508. 

Park, Mungo, 544. 

Parliament, British, during the Middle 
Ages, 201, 411 ; under the Tudors and the 
Stuarts, 282-294 ; reform of, during the 
nineteenth century, 469-479. 

Parliament Act of 1911, the, 482. 

Parma, 279, 417, 430, 437, 453. 

Parnell, C. S.,488. 

Par'the-non, the, 93. 

Par'thi-ans, the, 139, 153. 

Pasteur (pas-tur'), Louis, 644. 

Patricians (pcV-trish'ctns), the, at Rome, 119, 
120. 

Paul III, pope, 266, 267. 

Pax Britannica, the, 492. 

Peace Conference, the, 707,709, 710. 

Peace movement, the, 664, 665, 725-728. 

Peace, the Roman, 140, 141. 

Peary, Robert E., 577, 578. 

Peasants. Oriental, 42; Athenian, 92; Ro- 
man, 118, 131, 144; medieval, 216, 217, 219, 
220; modern, 350, 351, 607, 608, 

Peel, Sir Robert, 604. 

Peking (po-king'), 248, 559. 

Peloponnesian War, the, 97. 

Pel-o-pon-ne'sus, the, 81, 529. 

Penal code, the, reform of, 628-630. 



750 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Peninsular War, the, 401. 

Penn, William, 638, 726. 

Pennsylvania, 638. 

Per'i-cles, 96. 

Perry, Commodore M. 0., 561. 

Persecution, religious, 150, 151, 203, 257, 

263, 265, 268, 269, 270, 274, 275, 277, 285, 

291, 294, 352, 353, 636, 638. 
Per-sep'o-lis, 103, 104. 
Pershing-, General J. ,T., 702, 703. 
Persia, empire of, 37-39 ; wars of, with the 

Greeks, 84-89 ; conquered by Alexander the 

Great, 102-104; conflicts of, with Rome, 

153, 154 ; modern, 552, 553, 655. 
Peru, 254, 255, 569, 570. 
Peter I, king of Serbia, 660. 
Peter the Great, tsar of Russia, 304-307, 344, 

347. 

" Peter's Pence," 213. 

Petition of Right, the, 284, 285, 291, 293, 468. 
Petrarch (pe'trark), 241, 242. 
Petrine supremacy, the, doctrine of, 211, 268. 
Petrograd (pye-tro-graf), 699. 
Petroleum, 588. 
Phalanx, Macedonian, 98. 
Pharaoh (fa/ro), the, 32. 
Pharos (ftVros), lighthouse of, 106. 
Phid'i-as, 93. 

Philip II, king of Macedonia, 98-100. 
Philip II, king of Spain, 263, 269, 270, 272, 

274, 322, 395. 
Phi-Hp'pi, 98. 
Philippine Islands, 253, 254, note 1, 508, 541, 

564, 574. 

Philistines (fi-lis'tins), the, 35. 
Philosophy, Athenian, 96 ; modern, 644, 645. 
Phocis (fo'sis), 77. 
Phoenicia (fe-nish'I-a), 34. 
Phoenicians, the, 25, 34, 35, 47, 48, 62. 
Physics, 356, 357. 641, 643. 
Physiocrats, the, 354, 355, 369. 
Piave (pyii'vii) River, battles of the, 686, 704. 
Piedmont, 415, 423, 450 and note 1. 
Pilgrimages, Moslem, 183 ; Christian, 187, 1SS. 
Piltdown man, 6. 
Piracy, 46, 76, 229, 604. 
Piraeus (pi-re'ws), 79, note 1, 93. 
Pisa (pe'sa), 232, 240. 

Pitt, William (Earl of Chatham), 336, 398. 
Pitt, William (the Younger), 396 and note 1, 

468, 604. 

Pius IX, pope, 437, 450, 507 ; X, 507. 
Pizarro (Span. pron. pe-thar'6), Francisco, 

254. 
Plassey, battle of, 327. 
Pla-tse'a, battle of, 89. 
Pla'to, 96, 251. 
Plebeians (ple-be'yans), the, at Rome, 119, 

120. 
Plebiscites, 293, 407, 445, 456, 512, 710, note 2. 
Plevna, 535. 

Plymouth, settlement of, 328. 
Pnyx (niks), hill, at Athens, 91. 
Po, river, 112, 113, 121, 122, 125. 
" Pocket" boroughs, 470, 471, 472. 
Poetry, modern, 646. 
Poland, union of, with Lithuania, 279, 315 ; 

condition of, in the eighteenth centurv, 315, 

316; partitioned, 317, 318; the Grand 

Duchy of Warsaw, 398, 399, 417 ; after the 

Vienna settlement, 417 ; revolts in, 429, 430 ; 

in the World War, 682, 686, 700, 717; 

republic of, 712, 713, 717. 



Poles, the, 314, 315. 

Political parties, British, 485 ; French, 501, 
502 ; Italian, 505, 507. 

Polo, Marco, 248, 249, 3i3. 

Polynesia, 563. 

Pom-e-ra'ni-a, 277, 416, 417, 457. 

Pompeii (pom-pa/ye), 142. 

Pompey (pom'pi) 135, 136, 137. 

Pon-di-cher'ry, 325. 

Pope, the, as the successor of St. Peter, 
211 ; as the head of western Christendom, 
212, 213. 

Popular sovereignty, doctrine of, 282, 359, 
367, 407. 

Population, statistics of, 620, 621. 

Port Arthur, 551, 558, 563, 687. 

Porto Rico, 509, 573, 574. 

Portsmouth, Treaty of, 563. 

Portugal, 253, 254, 274 and note 1, 279, 300, 
322, 323, 400, 401, 421, 509, 695. 

Poseidon (po-sT'don), 76. 

Posen, 416, 429, 516, 712, 717. 

Postal service, the, 599. 

Potato Famine, the, in Ireland, 487. 

Potosi (po-to-se'), silver mines of, 255. 

Poverty, modern, 622, 623. 

Power loom, Cartwright's, 586. 

Pragmatic Sanction, the, 310. 

Prague (prag), Treaty of, 463. 

Prehistoric times, 1-28. 

Presbyterianism, 265, note 1, 288, 291, 352. 

Pretoria, 548. 

" Pride's Purge," 288. 

Priesthood, Oriental, 42. 

Primogeniture, 348. 

Prince Edward Island, 568. 

Printing, invention of, 242, 243. 

Prison reform , 629, 630. 

Privileged classes, the, in eighteenth-century 
Europe, 347-349. 

Proletariat, the, 350 and note 1, 381, 383, 385, 
431, 445, 618, 619, 722. 

Pro-py-lae'a of the Acropolis, 93. 

Protective system, the, 605. 

Protectorate, the, in England, 290. 

Protestantism, characteristics of, 263 ; sects 
of, 264, 265, 352, 639. 

Protocol of Troppau, the, 421, 525, 526. 

Provencal (pro-vaN-saK) speech, 237. 

Provence (pro-vaKs'), Count of, 379 and 
note 1 

Provincial system, Persian, 39 ; Roman, 
129, 130, 134, 140. 

Prussia, East, 279, 311, 814, 315, 516, 680; 
West, 311, 318, 516, 712, 717. 

Prussia, rise of, 311, 312; under Frederick 
the Great, 312-314, 318; wars of, with 
France, during the revolutionary and Napo- 
leonic era, 382, 385, 386, 396, 398, 403, 404, 
405 ; territprial acquisitions of, by the 
Vienna settlement, 416, 417 ; revolutionary 
movement of 1S48 in, 438, 439 ; as the uni- 
fier of Germany, 458, 459 ; under William I, 
459-461 ; wars of, with Denmark and Aus- 
tria, 462, 463 ; forms North German Con- 
federation, 463 ; at war with France, 464- 
466; heads new German Empire, 466, 513, 
515; govermnent of, 516. 

Ptolemies (tol'e-miz), the, 105, note 2, 130. 

Ptolemy, Greek scientist, 109, note, 247, 251, 
343. 

Public debts, statistics of, 725. 

Public lands, Roman, 133. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 751 



Public ownership, 014, G15. 
Public school system, the, 272, 353, 354, 363, 
684-686. 
Pu'nic Wars: First, 124, 125; Second, 126. 

127 ; Third, 127. 
Puritan Revolution, the. 286-290, 366, 407. 
Puritans, the, 283, 284, 285, 2S8. 
Pygmies, the, 542. 
Pym, John, 286, 287. 
Pyth'e-as, exploring voyage of, 109, note. 

Quakers, the, 291, 352, 639. 

Quebec, city, 329, 330, 333 ; province, 568. 

Queensland, 566. 

Races of man, the, 17-21. 

Racial types, European, 66, 67. 

"Rack-renting" in Ireland, 487. 

Radium, 643. 

Railroads, development of, 594, 595 ; owner- 
ship of, 615. 

Raleigh (ro'li), Sir "Walter, 273, 328. 

Ram-a-dan', 183. 

Rameses(rmn'e-sez) II, king of Egypt, 33, 41. 

Raphael (raPa-el), 244. 

Rationalism in the eighteenth century, 357- 
359 

Rebus, the, 24. 

Referendum, the, in Switzerland, 511. 

Reform Acts: First, 471, 472; Second, 477, 
635 ; Third, 477, 478. 

Reformation, the, 257-265. 

Reichsrat (riKs'rat), the, 721, 

Reichstag (rliis'taK), the, 514, 515, 721, 722. 

Reign of Terror, the, 386, 387, 471, 499. 

Reims (remz), 679, 702. 

" Reinsurance compact," the, 652. 

"Reliefs," feudal, 171. 

Religion, Pala?olithic, 11 ; Oriental, 52-55 ; 
Greek, 76-78; Roman, 116-118; in India, 
China, and Japan, 554, 555, 557, 561 ; sta- 
tistics of world religions, 639, 640. See also 
Christianity, Islam. 

Renaissance (re-na'sdns), the, 240-248. 

Representative system, absence of, at 
Athens and Rome, 92, 130; development 
of, 411 ; reform of, in Great Britain, during 
the nineteenth century, 469-479. 

Revolutionary War, American, 334-341, 367, 
370. 

Rhinelands, the, 297, 299, 705, 712. 

Rhine River, 297, 386. 

Rhode Island, 638. 

Rhodes (rodz), city, 106; island, 189, 714. 

Rhodes, Cecil, 493,' 548, 549, 550. 

Rhodesia, 493, 549, 550. 

Richelieu (re-she-lyu'). Cardinal, 276. 

Risorgimevto (re-z6r-je-m<5n't6), the, 448. 

Roads, 39, 123, 140, Wl, 592, 593. 

Robespierre (ro-bes-pyar), 381, 382, 384, 
3S5, 386, 3S7. 

Rockefeller, John T>., 636. 

Rocket, the, 594, 595. 

Rodin (ro-daN'), Auguste, 648. 

Rollo, 167. 168. 

Romagna (i-o-man'yii), 453 and note 2. 

Romance (ru-mans') languages, the, 146, 
147, 237. 

Roman Chureb, the, characteristics of, 203, 
204 ; doctrines and worship of, 204, 205 ; 
jurisdiction of, 205, 206; social and eco- 
nomic aspects of, 206, 207 ; the clergy, 
207-211; the medieval Papacy. 211-213; 



the Protestant Reformation, 257-263; the 
Catholic Counter Reformation, 266-269; 
during the eighteenth century, 351 ; in 
France, during the revolutionary and Napo- 
leonic era, 377, 380, 392 ; loss of temporal 
power by, 507 ; disestablishment of, in 
Europe, "639. 

Romanesque architecture, 231, 232. 

Romanization of western Europe, 123, 127, 

128, 137, 139, 145. 

Romanov (ro-ma'nof) dynasty, the, 304, 307, 
698. 

Roman Republic, Mazzini's, 437, 450, 454. 

Romans, the, early culture of, 116-119; their 
city-state, 119-121 ; rule of, over Italy, 122, 
123 ; provincial system under the republic, 

129, 130 ; effects of foreign conquests on, 
130-132 ; the world under Roman rule, 144- 
148 ; converted to Christianity, 149-151 ; 
influence of Christianity on, 151, 153. 

Rome, founding of, 115; early history of, 
116; contest between plebeians and patri- 
cians, 119, 120; burned by the Gauls, 121 ; 
becomes supreme in Italy, 121, 122; be- 
comes supreme in the Mediterranean, 123- 
129; the Gracchi, 133, 134; Marius and 
Sulla, 134-135 ; Pompey and Csesar, 135- 
138; Antony and Octavian, 138; the Early 
Empire, 138-144 ; the Later Empire, 153-156; 
as the capital of the Papacy, 213 ; becomes 
the Italian capital, 456. 

Rom'u-lus, first king of Rome, 116. 

Romulus Augustulus, 154, 155, 163, 176. 

Rontgen (runt'gen), W. K., 643. 

Roon, Albrecht von, 460, 461, 463, 464. 

Roosevelt (ro'ze-velt), Theodore, 563, 656. 

" Rotten " boroughs, 470, 471, 472. 

Rotterdam, 245. 

" Roundheads," the, 2S6 and note 1, 292. 

Rousseau (rGo-so'), J. J., 360, 361, 367, 378, 
388. 

Royal Road, Persian, 39. 

Royal Society, the, 357. 

Ru'bi-con River, 137. 

Rudolf of Hapsburg, Count, 309. 

Rumania, 535, 536, 537, 538, 651, 682, 684, 
686, 713, 714. 

Rumanians, the, 179, 530. 

Rump Parliament, the, 288, 289, 290. 

Ruric, 167, 304. 

Russia, the Northmen in, 167 ; Mongol con- 
quest of, 193 ; under Peter the Great, 302- 
307; under Catherine II, 307-309; in the 
Seven Years' War, 313, 314 ; during the 
Napoleonic period, 389, 390, 396, 397, 402. 
403, 404 ; territorial acquisitions of, by the 
Vienna settlement, 417 ; between 1815 and 
1914, 429, 430, 437, 447, 452, 462, 523-529, 
531, 532, 533, 534, 535, 536, 651, 652, 653, 
655, 660; in the World War, 670, 671, 680, 

681, 717, 718; expansion of, in Asia, 551, 
552. 558, 562, 563 ; the Russian Revolution, 

682, 697-700, 722, 723. 

Russian Revolution, the, 6S2, 697-700, 722, 
723. 

Kussians, the, 179, 302-304, 521, 522. 
Russification, policy of, 528, 537, 718. 
Russo-Japanese War, the, 562, 563. 
Russo-Turkish War, the, 535, 660. 
Ru-the'ni-ans, the, 717, 719 and note 1. 

Saar (zi'ir) Basin, 710. 
Sabbath, Hebrew, 51. 



752 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Sacraments, the, 204. 

Sadowa (sa'do-va). See Koniggratz. 

St. Benedict, 208. 

St. Brandan, islaDd of, 251. 

St. Dom'i-nic, 210. 

St. Francis, 210. 

St.-G-audens (g-o'd^nz), Augustus, 648. 

St. -Germain (zhar-maN'), treaty of, 713, 722. 

St. Helena, Napoleon at, 405. 

St. Lawrence River, 330. 

St.-Mihiel (me-ycl'), 703. 

St. Paul, 149, 150 ; cathedral of, 495. 

St. Peter, 211 ; church of, at Rome, 163, 213, 
244. 

St. Petersburg, 306 and note 1. See also 
Petrograd. 

Sa-kha-lin' Island, 563. 

Sal'a-mis, naval battle of, 89. 

Salisbury (solz'ber-I), Lord, 653 and note 1. 

Sa-lo-ni'ka, 684. 

Sal'va-dor, 572, 695, note 1. 

Salvation Army, the, 631, 632. 

Sa-ma'ri-a, 35. 

Sam'nites, the, 115, 122. 

Samoa, 565, 574, 712. 

Samson, 35. 

Samuel, 35. 

San Marino (ma-re'no), 222. 

Sans'krit, 23. 

San Stefan o (sta'fa-no), treaty of, 535, 536. 

Santo Domingo, 572, 707. 

Sar'a-cens, the, 182, note 1. 

Sarajevo (sa'ra-ya-vo), 669. 

Sard'inia, 122, 124, 125, 302. 385, 388, 415, 417, 
437, 450, 451, 452, 453, 455, 526, 534. 

Sardis, 39, 85, 88. 

Sargon I, 34. 

Saskatchewan, 568. 

Saturn, planet, 356. 

Saul, Hebrew king, 35. 

Saul of Tarsus. See St. Paul. 

Savagery and barbarism, 2. 

Savoy (sct-voi'), 302, 388, 415, 450, 452, 453. 

Saxons, the, 162. 

Saxony, 398, 417, 418, 430, 463. 

Scandinavia, 166, 512. 

Scarab, Egyptian, 52. 

Scheldt (skelt) River, 322. 

Schleswig (shlaz'viK), 462, 463, 516, 710 and 
note 2. See also Holstein. 

Science, Oriental, 58-62 ; Hellenistic, 109 ; 
Renaissance, 246-24S ; development of, dur- 
ing the eighteenth century, 355-357 ; mod- 
ern, 641-644. 

Scip'i-o, Pub'li-us, 126, 127. 

Scotland, 139, 197, 261, 263, 279, 283, 285. 

Scott, Captain R. P., 578. 

Scott, Sir Walter, 645. 

Scribes, Oriental, 60. 

Sculpture, Palaeolithic, 11 ; Oriental, 57 ; 
Renaissance, 244, 246 ; modern, 648. 

Scu'ta-ri, 660. 

Scythians (sith'i-«ns), the, 85. 

Sea-power, British, 273, 274, 327, 328, 332, 
396, 398, 399, 490, 492. 

Secret societies, 639. 

Sects, Protestant, 264, 265, 352, 639. 

Secularization of Church property, 377, 392. 

Sedan (se-daN'), 464, 498, 703. 

Seine (san) River, 163. 

Seleucia (se-lu'shl-iV), 106. 

Se-leu'cids, the, 105, note 2, 110. 

Seljuk (sel-jook'), Turks, the, 187, 188, 193. 



Semitic languages, 22. 

Senate, Roman, 119, 120, 121, 129, 132, 133, 

134, 135, 137, 138, 145. 
Sennacherib (se-nak'er-ib), 37, 41, 45. 
Separatists. See Independents. 
Sepoy Mutiny, the, 553. 
" Sepoys," the, 327, 553. 
" September massacres," the, 3S3. 
Serbia, 532, 536, 537, 539, 660, 661, 667, 669, 

670, 671, 682, 683, 686, 715, 716. 
Serfdom, medieval, 206, 207, 219, 221; sur- 
vival of, in the eighteenth century, 350 ; 

abolition of, in the nineteenth century, 403, 

526, 562, 608. 
Ser'i-ca, 29. 

Sevastopol, siege of, 534. 
Seven Hills of Rome, the, 115, 456. 
" Seven liberal arts," the, 236. 
" Seven Weeks' War." See Austro-Prussian 

War. 
Seven Tears' War, the, 313, 314, 327, 328, 

332, 333, 335, 363, 367, 553, 583. 
Sevres (sa'vr'), treaty of, 714. 
Seychelles (sa-shel'), 492. 
Shackelton, Sir Ernest, 578. 
Shaftesbury, Earl of, 611, 612. 
Shakespeare, William, 246, 247. 
Shantung (shiin'tdong'), 716. 
Sinn Fein (shin fan), the, 485, 489. 
Sistine Chapel, the, 244. 
She'al, Hebrew underworld, 55, 76. 
Shi'nar, 30, 33, 57. 
"Ship-money," 285, 286. 
Ships, 48, 83, 143, 167, 178, 262, 273, 395, 593, 

690 
Shogun (sho'goon), Japanese, 561, 562. 
Siam (si-am'), 249, 552, 553, 695. 
Siberia, 541, 550, 551, 716, 723. 
Sicily, colonized by the Greeks, 84; the 

Carthaginians in, 84, 122,124; annexed by 

Rome, 125 ; Romanized, 127 ; the Normans 

in, 168, 169 ; acquired by Savoy, 302 ; joined 

to the kingdom of Italy, 455. 
Sidney, 566. 
Si'don, 34. 
Sienkiewicz (Polish pron. sh<5n-kya'vich), 

Henryk, 646. 
Si-er'ra Le-o'ne, 493. 
Sieyes (sya-yeV), the Abbe, 371, 372, 390. 
Si-le'si-a, Prussian, 313, 314; Austrian, 716. 
Sinai (si'ni), peninsula of, 15. 
Sing-a-pore', 492. 
Sinkiang (sin-kyang'), 556. 
Six Points, Chartist, 474. 
Slavery, Oriental, 43 ; Greek, 92 ; Roman, 

130, 131, 143, 144, 147, 148 ; medieval, 206, 

207, 219 ; abolition of, in the nineteenth 

century, 628. 
Slave trade, the, abolition of, 628 
Slavs, the, 521, 530. 
Slo-va'ki-a, 716. 
Smith, Adam, 355, 581, 604. 
Smyrna (smur'na), 714. 
Sobieski (Polish pron. so-byes'ke), John, 308. 
Social betterment, modern, 628-632. 
Social Contract, Rousseau's, 361, 619. 
Social Democratic Party, German, 619, 620, 

704, 720, 721. 
Socialism, 616-620, 69S-700, 704, 720, 721, 

722, 723. 
Society of Jesus, the, 266, 267. 
Sociology, 645. 
Soc'ra-tes, 96. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 753 



Sofia (s6f§-ya), 708. 

Soissons (swii-sos'), 702. 

Solferino (sol-fe-re'no), battle of, 452. 

Solomon, 35, 86, 37, 41, 47. 

So-ma'li-laml, French, 503, 547 ; Italian, 507, 
547. 

Somme (som) River, the, battle of, 678, 679. 

Sophia, eleetress of Hanover, 294. 

South African War, the, 490, 548, 654. 

South Australia, 566. 

South Company of Sweden, 329. 

South Pole, the, discovery of, 57S. 

South Slavs. See Jugoslavs. 

Soviets (so-vyets'), Russian, 09S, 699, 700. 

Spain, Phoenicians in, 47, 4S, 124, 125; an- 
nexed by Kouie, 127 ; Romanized, 128, 199 ; 
conquered by the Visigoths and Moors, 
199 ; unification of, during the Middle Ages, 
200 ; colonial empire of, 254, 255 ; under 
Charles V and Philip II, 269, 270, 271, 272, 
273, 274 and note 1 ; in the War of the 
Spanish Succession, 299, 300, 302 ; at war 
with England, 338, 339, 340; during the 
Napoleonic period, 385, 3S6, 39S, 400, 401 ; 
the Bourbon restoration in, 414, 415, 423, 
508; modern, 50S, 509. 

Spanish-American War, the, 50S, 572. 

Spanish Succession, the War of, 299, 300. 

Sparta, 79, 81, 82, S5, 87; 88, 89, 97, 99, 100, 110. 

Speke, Captain J. H., 544. 

Spencer, Herbert, 645. 

Spice Islands, 253, 323. 

Spinning, improvements in, 584-586. 

Spinning wheel, the, 584. 

Spitzbergen Archipelago, 512, note 2. 

Stagecoach, the, 592. 

Stamp Act, the, 335, 336. 

Stanlev, Sir Henry M ., 546. 

States of the Church, the, 213, 279, 415, 417, 
430. 437, 447, 453, note 2, 455, 456, 507. 

Steamboat, the, 593, 594. 

Steam engine, Watt's, 587. 

Stein (stln), Baron von, 413, 418, 458. 

Stephenson, George, 594, 595. 

Straits Settlements, 552. 

Strasbourg, 161, 299, 444, 465. 

Stuart dynasty, the, 283, 284, 291, 293, 294, 
295, notel. 

Submarine boat, the, 597. 

Submarine cable, the, 598. 

"Submerged nationalities," 415, 516, 582, 
715. 

Sudan, Anglo-Egyptian, 549. 

Suez Canal, 550, 659, 727. 

Suffrage, manhood, 434, 435, 444, 474, 478, 
508, 511 ; woman, 478, 511, 632, 633. 

Suigrave Manor. 214. 

Sul'la, Lu'ci-us Cor-ne'li-us, 135, 137. 

Su-me'ri-ans, the, 33, 34. 

Supreme Council, the, 707, 70S. 725. 

Supreme Court, the, of the United States, 
342. 

Su'sa. Persian capital, 39, 103. 

Svllabaries, 25. 

Swas'ti-ka, the, 75. 

Sweden. 166, 261, 265, 276, 277, 279, 29S, 306, 
307,396. 416,417, 512, 633. 

Swiss Confederation. See Switzerland. 

Switzerland, 196, 261, 277. 279, 289, note 1, 
397, 398, 417, 510, 511, 727. 

Taille (ta'y'),the. 351. 
Talleyrand '(ta-lc-r:i.N'), 413, 414. 



Tanganyika (tan-gan-ye'ka); Lake, 546. 

Tan nen berg (tan'nSn-bih'K), battle of, 680. 

Ta-ran'to, Gulf of, 114. 

Tarsus, 149. 

Tasman, Abel, 343. 

Tasmania, 343, 566. 

Ta'tars, the, 68, 304, 522. 

" Taxation without representation," 335, 336. 

Telegraph, the, 597, 598. 

Telephone, the, 598. 

Templars, the order of, 189. 

Temples, Oriental, 56, 57, 61 ; Greek, 93. 

Temporal power of the Papacy, the, 213, 447, 

507. 

Ten Commandments, the, 50, 52. 
Ten-Hour Act, the, 612. 
" Tennis Court Oath," the, 373, 378. 
Tertiarv (tur'shl-a-ri) epoch, the, 3. 
Tes-tu'do, the, 136. 
Teutonic Knights, the, 311. 
Teutonic languages, the, 158, 237, 238. 
Teutonic peoples. See Germans, Northmen. 
Texas, 573. 

Thackeray, W. M., 646. 
Thebes (thebz), in Egvpt, 32. 
Thebes, in Greece, 79, 81, 97, 98, 99, 100, 

101. 
The-mis'to-cles, 88, S9. 
Ther-mop'y-lae, battle of, 88. 
Thes'sa-ly, 76, SO, S9, 99, 533. 
Thiers (tyar), L. A., 434, 498, 499. 
Third Estate, the, in eighteenth-century 

Europe, 349-351. 
Third Section, Kussian, 526, 528. 
Thirteen Colonies, the, settlement of, 324, 

328 ; revolt of, 324-341. 
Thirty Tears' War, the, 276, 277, 278, 436, 

456. 

Thorwaldsen (tor'wold-sen), Bertel, 648. 
Thrace (thras), 85, S6, 98, 101, 533, 714. 
Ti'ber Uiver, 115. 

Tibet (ti-b8tf), 249, 552, 553, 556, 577, 655. 
Tilsit (til'zit), Peace of, 396, 397, 399, 400. 
Tim-buk'tn, 544. 
Timor (te-mor'), 564. 
Tirvns (ti'rins), 71, notel. 
Tithes, church, 351. 
Titian (tish'an), 244. 
Togo, 547, 686, 712. 
Toleration, religious, 265, 269, 272, 275, 352, 

353, 358, 361, 362, 363, 636, 638, 639. 
Toleration Act, the, 294, 353, 638. 
Tolstoy (tol-stoiO, Count, L. N., 646. 
Ton-kin', 552. 
" Tories," the, 338, 566. 
Tory Party, the, 292, 468, 471, 472, 473. See 

also Conservative Party. 
Toul (tfjol), 277, 297, 671. 
Toulon (too-loNO, 3S5, 38S, 389. 
Tours (toor), battle of, 184, 187. 
" Tower of Babel," the, 57. 
Tower of London, the, 173. 
Townshend Acts, the, 335, 336. 
Trade unions, 609, 610. 
Trade Union Act of 1S75, the, 610. 
Tra'jan, Roman emperor, 139. 
Transportation, inventions in. 592-597. 
Trans-Siberian Railway, the, 551, 653. 
Transvaal (trans-val'), the, 54S. 
Tran-syl-va'ni-a, 684, 718, 
Trent,' Council of, 267, 26S. 
Trentino (tren-tc'nf>). the, 456, 6S5, 697, 713. 
Tribunes, Roman, 120, 133, 134. 



754 Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 



Tricolor, the, 375, 425. 

Trieste (tre-es'ta), 456, 685, 6S6, 704. 

Triple Alliance, the, 651, 652, 653, 654, 655, 

661, 684. 
Triple Entente, the, 655, 670. 
Tri-po-li-ta'ni-a, 508. 
Tri'reme, the, 83. 
Troppau (trop'ou), 421, 526. 
Trotsky, Leon, 699, 700, 723. 
Troy, 71, note 1, 75, 102. 
"Truce of God," the. 206. 
Tudor dynasty, the, 262, 282, 283. 
Tuileries (twel-re'), the palace of, 380, 383, 

387, 393, 443, 446. 
Tunis, 503, 504, 547, 651. 
Turgot (tiir-go'), 369, 370, 376. 
Turin (tu'rin), 455. 
Tur-ke-stan', 104, 551, 556. 
Turko-ltalian War, the, 508, 547, 714. 
Turkey. See Ottoman Empire. 
Turks. See Ottoman Turks, Seljuk Turks. 
Tus'ca-ny, 113, 279, 417, 437, 453. 
Twelve Tables, the, laws of, 120, 145. 
Two Sicilies, kingdom of the, 16S, 169, 279, 

415, 418, 423, 437, 455. 
Tyrannies, Greek, 81. 
Tyre (tir), 34, 48, 102, 103. 
Tyrrhenian (ti-re'nl-an) Sea, 69. 
Tze-hsi (tse-she'), empress-dowager of China, 

559. 

U-boat warfare, German, 688, 689, 690, 691, 

693, 694, 701. 
Ukraine (u'kran), the, 304 and note 1, 700, 

719. 

Ulm (oolm),39G, 397. 
Ulster, 485, 4S9. 
Um'bri-ans, the, 115. 
Union Jack, the, 469. 
Union of South Africa, the, 548, 686, 712. 
Unitarians, the, 294, 352, 353. 
United Kingdom, the, 479, note 1. 
United Netherlands. See Holland. 
United States, the, 341, 342, 423, 508, 541, 

564, 565, 567, 570, 573-576, 690-697, 709, 710. 
Universities, medieval, 234-236. 
U'ra-nus, planet, 356, 641, note 1. 
Usury, 205. 
Utrecht (u'trekt), union of, 270, 272. 412; 

peace of, 300, 302, 331, 416, 707. 

Valmy (val-me'), battle of, 384. 

Vandals, the, 159, 160, 161. 

Van Diemen's Land. See Tasmania. 

Varennes (va-ren'), 380. 

Vassalage, 170, 171. 

Vat'i-can, the, palace, 213, 244, 506, 507; 

council, 267, note 1. 
Vendee (vaN-dsV), La, 385. 
Ve-ne'ti-a, 416, 417, 452, 453, 456, 462, 463, 

686. 
Venezuela, 569, 570, 727. 
Venice. 231, 24., 243. 255, 279. 389, 397, 437. 
Venizelos (va-ne-za'los), Eleutherios, 533, 

682, 684. 
Verdun ( ver-d Tin') , bishopric, 277, 297 ; city, 

671. 673, 675. 678. 683, 703. 
Verdun, treaty of, 164. 
Versailles (ver-sii'y'), 297, 370, 372, 466, 707, 

708, 709. 
Versailles, treaty of (1783), 339, 340 ; treaties 

of (1919), 706, 709, 710, 712, 713. 714. 
Vesta, 118. 



Victor Emmanuel II, king of Italy, 437, 450, 

451, 453, 455, 505, 534 ; III, 505. 
Victoria, queen of England, 457, note 1, 

473, note 1, 480, 496, 517, 553, 654. 
Victoria, colony of, 566. 
Victoria Cross, the, 683. 
Vienna, SOS, 309, 3S8, 396. 
Vienna, Congress of, 413-418, 420, 426, 427, 

429, 431, 442, 447, 458, 510, 511, 650, 707. 
Vikings (vi'kings), the, 166, note 1, 512. 
Vil-la-fran'ca, armistice of, 453. 
Villages, medieval, 216, 217. 
Virginia, 328, 329. 
Virgin Islands, 513, 574. 
Vis'i-goths, the, 159, 160, 161, 191, 199. 
Vis'tu-la Kiver, 15S. 
Vla-di-vos-tok', 551. 
Volapiik (vo-la-pi'ik'), 626. 
Volta, 356. 

Voltaire (vol-tar'), 360, 362, 363, 369. 
Vries (vres), Hugo de, 643. 

Wagner (viig'ner), Eichard, 648. 

Wagram (va'gram), battle of, 401. 

Wales, 197, 263, 639. 

Wallachia (wo-la'ki-d), 535. 

Walloons, the, 426, 509. 

Warfare, ancient Oriental, 39, 40; feudal, 
174, 175 ; attitude of the Church toward, 
206; modern, 661-665, 727, 728. 

War of 1812-1814, the, 567. 

Warsaw, 315. 

Wartburg (vart'bcSorK), the, 260. 

Washington, George, 337, 341. 

Waterloo, battle of, 404, 405. 

Watt, James, 587. 

Wavre (vav'r'), 405. 

Wealth, increase and diffusion of, 621, 622. 
Wealth of Nations, Smith's, 305, 581, 619. 

Weaving, improvements in, 5S4-5S6. 

Weekdays, the names of, 53 and note 1. 

Weihaiwei (wa'hi-wa'), 492, 558, note 1. 

Weimar (vi'mar), 721. 

Wellesley (welz'li), Sir Arthur. See Welling- 
ton, Duke of. 

Wellington, Duke of, 401, 404, 405, 413, 471, 

472, 474. 

Wesley, John, 352. 
Western Australia, 566. 
West Goths. See Visigoths. 
West India Company, Dutch, 324. 
West-pha'li-a, Peace of, 276, 277, 278, 297, 

416, 417, 448, 707. 

Whig Party, the, 292. 468, 471, 472, 473. 

White Eace, 17, 20-21. 

Whitney, Eli, 5S6. 

Wilberforce, William, 628. 

Wilhelmina, Queen, 511. 

Willard, Frances E., 631. 

William I. king of Prussia and German em- 
peror. 459, 460, 463, 464, 516, 517, 663, 666; 
II, 517. 51 S, 519, 652, 654, 656, 657, 658, 660, 
667, 671, 673, 701, 704, 724. 

William III, king of England. 293, 294, 299 
and note 1, 300, 331, 4S5 ; IV, 472, note 1, 

473, note 1. 

William, Prince of Orange. See William 

III. 

William the Conqueror, 168, 197. 
William the Silent, 272. 
Williams, Roger, 638. 
Wilson, Woodrow, 673, 690, 691, 693, 697, 

709, 728. 



Index and Pronouncing Vocabulary 755 



Windsor (win'zer) Castle, 475. 

Windsor dynasty, 295. 

Wireless telegraphy and telephony, 598, 599. 

"Witchcraft, European, 205. 

Wittenberg (viWn-berK), 258, 259, 260. 

Wolfe, Jauies, 333. 

Woman, position of, 49, 76, 116, 175, 176, 

305, 632-634. 
Women's Christian Temperance Union, the, 

631. 

Workshops, national, in France, 618. 
World congresses, 627. 
World Court, the, 730. 
World War, the, 669-705, 723-725. 
Worms (vormz), Diet of, 259, 260. 
Wright Brothers, the, 596. 
Writing, development of, 23-27 ; Cretan, 73. 
Wurtemberg (viir'tem-berK), 398, 418. 
Wycliffe (wlk'lif), John, 258. 

X-rays, the, 643. 



Xerxes (zurk'zez), king of Persia, 87, 88, 89. 

Yellow Eace, the, 17, 20-21, 190-194. 

Yorktown, 338. 

" Young Italy," 449, 450. 

Young Men's Christian Association, the, 632. 

Young Turks, the, 537, 660, 715. 

Ypres (e'pr'), battles of, 676, 678, 702. 

Yser (e'zr') Eiver, 676. 

Za'ma, battle of, 127. 
Zam'be-si Eiver, 545. 
Zeppelin (tsep-^-len'), Count, 596. 
Zeus (ziis), 76, 77. 
Zodiac, the, 59 and note 1. 
Zollverein (ts61'f<*r-In), the, 458, 461. 
Zo-ro-as'ter, 54. 
Zoroastrianism, 54, 184. 
Zurich (zoS'rik), 261. 

Zwingli (Ger. pron. tsving'le), Huidreich 
261. 



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